Hyderabad, Aug. 18 -- The Telangana High Court has ruled that police investigating unnatural or accidental deaths must submit their final reports before the jurisdictional Judicial Magistrate of the First Class rather than an Executive Magistrate.

According to LiveLaw, Justice Suddala Chalapathi Rao issued the ruling while hearing a petition filed by a woman whose husband allegedly died after falling into a ditch excavated for a water pipeline project.

While declining to order a fresh investigation into the 2014 incident, the court said that the procedure governing the filing of final reports must be followed in such cases. It held that investigations into unnatural deaths should culminate in a report being placed before the appropriate...