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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The appellants were convicted by a Magistrate for dishonour of a cheque worth about Rs. 2.52 crore under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act. While their appeal against conviction was pending, the Sessions Court suspended their sentence but only on condition they deposit 20% of the compensation amount, relying on Section 148 of the NI Act; the High Court upheld this condition. The appellants argued that the courts below had wrongly treated the 20% deposit as an absolute, mandatory rule with no room for exceptions.
The Supreme Court held that its earlier ruling in Surinder Singh Deswal (2019) required only a "purposive interpretation" of Section 148, meaning the 20% deposit condition is the normal rule but not an inflexible one: an appellate court can waive or reduce it in an exceptional case where imposing it would be unjust or would effectively deny the right of appeal, provided it records specific reasons for doing so. The Court rejected the complainant's argument that an accused must specifically plead for an exception before one can be considered, holding that when a person seeks unconditional suspension of sentence, the court must itself examine whether the case is an exceptional one. Since both the Sessions Court and High Court had wrongly treated the 20% deposit as an absolute rule, the Supreme Court set aside their orders and sent the matter back to the High Court to reconsider the revision petitions in light of this clarified legal position, while continuing the existing suspension of sentence in the interim.
In cheque-bounce cases, the requirement to deposit at least 20% of the compensation before an appellate court suspends a sentence is the default rule, not an unbreakable one: a court can excuse or reduce it in genuinely exceptional circumstances if it records clear reasons, and an accused seeking unconditional relief does not need to specifically ask for this exception for the court to consider it.
