Real judgements, distilled
Court judgements broken down into the case type, how the decision played out, and the lesson worth remembering, with the full judgement available as a PDF.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1066
Courts will not infer a concluded oral contract for the sale of immovable property just because the other side's witnesses seemed evasive: the party seeking specific performance must independently and affirmatively prove every essential term was genuinely agreed.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1065
Even in serious, high-value corruption cases, prolonged pre-trial detention cannot be used as a substitute for punishment when the trial is unlikely to conclude soon and the evidence is already secured: bail remains the touchstone principle under Article 21's personal liberty protection.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1067
Preventive detention cannot be used as a backdoor way to keep someone in custody once the ordinary criminal process, including bail, has already run its course on the same facts; the detaining authority must show a genuine, independent risk of future harm, not just recycle the criminal case file.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1068
In land acquisition disputes, courts will readily restore a uniform, fair market rate across similarly-situated parcels, but ancillary compensation heads (like moveable equipment such as tubewells) still require the claimant to prove their case with admissible evidence, not private reports whose authors were never examined in court.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8447
If you are injured while genuinely trying to board or exit a train, you are very likely covered under railway "untoward incident" compensation law, even if you technically hadn't fully boarded yet: courts read this protection broadly in favour of passengers, and contemporaneous official records (station logs, police diary entries) carry more weight than a statement taken from you much later.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8404
Courts will not entertain vague, unsubstantiated allegations of judicial bias, and a request to combine cases becomes moot once the other related proceedings have already concluded: genuine grievances about trial delay or procedure must be backed by specific, demonstrable facts, not just repeated litigation.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8403
Anticipatory bail can be granted even in matrimonial cases involving serious sexual-offence allegations where there is unexplained delay in reporting, no evidence substantiating the need for custodial interrogation, and the investigating agency's own conduct (e.g., undocumented "verbal" notices) fails to justify arrest, though this is assessed only for bail purposes, not as a finding on guilt.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8407
In family property disputes, signing a Relinquishment Deed acknowledging receipt of consideration, and then waiting years without challenging it or pursuing your claimed share, will make it very difficult to later prove you were never actually paid; courts expect contemporaneous action (a legal notice, a suit) and corroborating evidence, not delayed assertions alone.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8401
A tenant who claims to have paid a large sum toward an informal "mortgage" or side arrangement must be able to prove it with solid evidence (receipts, corroborating witnesses): bare assertions, especially when contradicted by one's own family members under cross-examination, will not defeat a landlord's claim for rent and possession.
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Legal Case Shots is a searchable database of Supreme Court of India judgments, each broken down into the case type, the court's key holding, and a practical lesson learnt, with the full judgment available as a PDF for citation or deeper reading.
Shapoorji Pallonji and Company (SPCPL) was engaged in a construction dispute arising from a redevelopment project (the "Black Canyon" project) with Black Canyon SEZ Pvt. Ltd. (BCSPL), a company belonging to the "ASF Group." When arbitration was initiated, SPCPL sought to bring in two other ASF Group companies: ASF Insignia SEZ Pvt. Ltd. and ASF Buildtech Pvt. Ltd. (the appellant), as parties, even though they had not signed the arbitration agreement themselves, arguing they were all functionally part of one group that intended to be bound. The sole arbitrator allowed this, the Delhi High Court upheld it, and ASF Buildtech appealed to the Supreme Court.
In a lengthy, wide-ranging judgment surveying conflicting High Court decisions and the evolution of the law since Chloro Controls, Cox and Kings (I) and (II), and related rulings, the Supreme Court held that an arbitral tribunal does have the power, on its own, to implead a non-signatory to an arbitration agreement where the facts show that entity was intended to be bound by it, applying the "Group of Companies" doctrine. It further held that a formal notice of invocation under Section 21 of the Arbitration Act is mandatory in general but its non-service on a particular non-signatory does not by itself nullify the tribunal's jurisdiction over that party. On the facts, the Court found ASF Buildtech, ASF Insignia, and BCSPL functioned as one cohesive group with common directors, intertwined contracts (a Works Contract, Novation Agreement, Settlement Agreement, and a Comfort Letter), and consistent conduct showing mutual intent to be bound together, so their impleadment was justified. The appeal was dismissed, and the Court used its concluding remarks to urge the government to give this power express statutory recognition in the pending Arbitration and Conciliation Bill, 2024.
Companies operating as a single, closely-linked business group (sharing directors, correspondence, and interdependent contracts on the same project) can be pulled into an arbitration even if they never personally signed the arbitration clause, if their conduct shows they were meant to be bound by it; simply keeping a subsidiary's name off a contract is not a reliable way to shield it from arbitration arising out of the group's dealings.
