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.
Transfer Petition (Criminal) · 2026 INSC 1060
Where a marriage has irretrievably broken down and the parties reach a genuine, voluntary settlement, including on alimony, the Supreme Court can use its Article 142 powers to grant a mutual-consent divorce and close out all related litigation in one stroke, without requiring the usual statutory waiting period.
Writ Petition (Civil) · 2026 INSC 1061
In long-running, complex litigation involving apportioned government liabilities across states, the Supreme Court can use a mechanism like a retired-judge committee plus periodic compliance affidavits to bring genuine finality, including firm timelines, transparency obligations, and interest for delayed payment, rather than leaving matters open-ended.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1062
In an "as is where is" liquidation auction, a bidder who voluntarily accepts the auction terms cannot later resile from a forfeiture clause by citing regulatory caps or after-the-fact excuses for non-payment: courts will enforce the auction notice's own conditions.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8338-DB
Once someone is released from custody because the police failed to properly communicate the grounds of arrest, the police cannot simply re-arrest them by adding new charges: a specific, court-supervised procedure with senior-officer accountability must be followed, or the re-arrest itself becomes illegal.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8308
In economic-offence cases, bail can still be granted where the method used to quantify the alleged financial evasion is not adequately justified, and where the apprehension of re-offending is speculative rather than evidence-based.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8323
A parole claim must be backed by a genuine, verifiable application to the competent jail authority: courts will scrutinise irregularities like an incomplete address, an unexplained thumb mark, or reliance on a mere friend's affidavit rather than close family.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8337
Courts can grant short, strictly time-bound interim bail purely on humanitarian/compassionate grounds (such as caring for a seriously ill family member), even while a case remains pending trial and an earlier bail plea has failed.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8312
Courts will not repeatedly re-examine a bail plea already rejected on merits unless the applicant can point to a genuine change in circumstances since the earlier order.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8334
Under the no-fault compensation scheme for railway accidents, a valid ticket-holder injured while attempting to board a train, even carelessly, is generally entitled to compensation unless the railway can show a deliberate, conscious exposure to danger, not mere negligence.
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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.
The appellant-wife and respondent-husband married in December 2014. The wife, an Infosys employee who had been living in the US, moved back to India and cohabited with the husband before differences arose and she was later deputed abroad again. In 2022, the husband filed for divorce on the ground of desertion, alleging the wife left the matrimonial home in January 2020 and never returned. The Family Court granted a divorce decree on the ground of desertion, and the High Court of Orissa affirmed it on appeal. The wife challenged this before the Supreme Court, disputing that she had "deserted" her husband, though she was open to divorce by mutual consent.
Before the Supreme Court, both parties agreed that the marriage had irretrievably broken down and were willing to have it dissolved by mutual consent, though the wife objected to the decree being founded on the stigmatizing ground of desertion. The Court set aside the desertion-based finding and instead exercised its special power under Article 142 of the Constitution to dissolve the marriage by mutual consent. Since both parties were financially independent working professionals, the Court fixed a one-time lump-sum payment of Rs. 25 lakh as full and final settlement, including permanent alimony, to be paid within two months, after which all pending matrimonial proceedings between them would stand closed.
The Supreme Court can use its Article 142 power to convert a contested divorce (e.g., on the ground of desertion) into a mutual-consent divorce when both parties agree the marriage has irretrievably broken down, avoiding the need to formally establish fault-based grounds and settling all related claims through a one-time payment.
