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.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1073
In circumstantial-evidence cases, forensic and DNA evidence must actually corroborate the alleged crime: a conviction cannot survive where the most crucial scientific evidence, on its own terms, points away from rather than toward the prosecution's theory.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1074
A conviction based purely on circumstantial evidence requires every link in the chain, timeline, witness credibility, forensic matches, and motive, to be proven beyond reasonable doubt; gaps or suppressed evidence at any link entitle the accused to the benefit of the doubt, even in a serious case like a double murder.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8505
Courts will not quash a criminal case merely because the accused has a plausible alibi-type defence; unless that defence is conclusive and undisputed, the matter must be tested through the ordinary trial process.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8547
A private compromise between victim and accused cannot by itself secure quashing of a case involving serious, heinous allegations like attempted murder with a weapon: such matters must proceed to trial regardless of settlement.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8563
Railway Claims Tribunals cannot reject a bona fide passenger's death claim based on speculative inferences when there is no direct evidence of an alternative cause of death; the compensation scheme under the Railways Act is to be interpreted generously in favour of victims' families.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8559
In matrimonial offences, courts can and do quash criminal proceedings once a genuine compromise is verified directly with the complainant, sparing both parties a prolonged and pointless trial.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8541
A co-accused's bail does not automatically extend to another accused where their actual roles in the offence differ materially; delay caused by one's own defence counsel cannot later be used as a ground for bail.
Execution Petition · 2026:DHC:8567
An arbitral award must be adequately stamped before a court can enforce it; courts give only a limited window to cure such defects, after which the award becomes legally unusable until the deficiency is fixed.
Arbitration Petition · 2026:DHC:8555
A genuine settlement reached through mediation renders a pending arbitration-related court petition moot, allowing parties to close out litigation quickly once they resolve their dispute privately.
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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.
A cement factory in Porbandar, Gujarat, run by the respondent-company, closed in 1998 without paying roughly 500 workers' outstanding wages. The workers' union obtained a wage-recovery order from the Labour Court at Junagadh (Gujarat), but it went unexecuted after a bank separately had the company's assets ordered to be sold through the Debt Recovery Tribunal at Calcutta. The union then filed a writ petition in the Gujarat High Court, which a Single Judge entertained, but a Division Bench of the same High Court later held in a Letters Patent Appeal that the Gujarat High Court lacked territorial jurisdiction to hear it at all, prompting this appeal to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court held that under Article 226(2) of the Constitution, a High Court has jurisdiction wherever any part of the "cause of action" arises, even if the authority being challenged is based elsewhere. Since the respondent-company's factory was in Gujarat, the Labour Court that passed the original wage-recovery order was in Gujarat, and the dispute concerned non-payment of wages to workers employed at that Gujarat factory, the Court found that part of the cause of action clearly arose within Gujarat. It therefore allowed the appeal, set aside the Division Bench's ruling, and restored the Single Judge's finding that the writ petition was maintainable in the Gujarat High Court, sending the case back to the Single Judge to decide the petition on its merits (uninfluenced by either court's earlier observations), with a request to decide it within six months given its age.
A High Court can hear a case even against a company or authority based in another state, as long as some part of the events giving rise to the dispute, such as the workplace, the original order, or the obligation itself, occurred within that High Court's territory.
