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Legal Case Shots

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.

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What is Legal Case Shots?+

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.

Civil Property & InheritanceSupreme Court of India

District Appropriate Authority v. Kaushik Babulal Shah & Anr.

Criminal Appeal · 2025 INSC 637Decided 6 May 2025
Crl.A. No.-001969-001970 - 2017
Justice Bela M. Trivedi · Justice Prasanna B. Varale

Background

A sting operation in 2009 alleged that the respondent, a doctor, had disclosed the sex of a foetus during a sonography test in exchange for money, in violation of the PC & PNDT Act. His sonography machine was seized and sealed as case property. He was subsequently acquitted by the Metropolitan Magistrate, and that acquittal was confirmed by the Sessions Court. He then approached the Gujarat High Court seeking release of the sealed machine, which the High Court granted (while allowing the authority to retrieve any data from it first), even though an application for leave to appeal the acquittal was still pending.

Decision Breakdown

The Appropriate Authority argued that Section 29 of the Act required records and case property to be preserved until "such proceedings" attained finality, including any pending appeal. The Supreme Court held that after 16 years, with the doctor acquitted by two courts and no specified time limit fixed by the statute or any notification for how long the machine had to stay sealed, there was no justifiable reason to keep it locked up indefinitely, doing so would only render the machine useless. The Court noted the High Court had already built in a safeguard letting the authority retrieve any needed data before the seal was opened, in the doctor's presence, and found this adequately protected the authority's interests. The appeals were dismissed, though the underlying question of law was left open for a future case.

Lesson Learnt

Seized property cannot be held in official custody indefinitely merely because litigation is still technically pending, especially once the person has been acquitted by more than one court, and courts will look for a practical solution that protects both evidentiary needs and the owner's livelihood.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)
District Appropriate Authority v. Kaushik Babulal Shah & Anr. – Legal Case Shots | LegalAware