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 company had defaulted on loans guaranteed personally by respondents 1 and 2; the Bank (as assignee of the debt) obtained a recovery certificate from the Debts Recovery Tribunal (DRT) for Rs. 145 crore with interest, after accounting for a large compensation amount (over Rs. 152 crore) received from land acquisition of the company's mortgaged property. When the guarantors appealed to the Debts Recovery Appellate Tribunal (DRAT), they sought a full waiver of the mandatory pre-deposit under Section 21 of the RDBA Act, arguing the compensation already received exceeded the decretal debt. The DRAT ordered a 50% pre-deposit on the remaining balance, but the Delhi High Court set that aside and allowed the guarantors to appeal without any pre-deposit, prompting the Bank's appeal to the Supreme Court along with a contempt petition over non-compliance with an earlier Rs. 20 crore deposit direction.
The Supreme Court held that Section 21 of the RDBA Act mandates a pre-deposit of 50% of the debt due before an appeal can be entertained, with discretion to reduce this only down to a floor of 25% for recorded reasons, never to a complete waiver, relying on its own precedent on the analogous SARFAESI Act provision (Narayan Chandra Ghosh v. UCO Bank). Since the DRAT had itself found a balance debt of roughly Rs. 68 crore still outstanding even after crediting the compensation amount, the High Court had no power to waive the pre-deposit entirely, and its order was set aside. Taking into account that a major portion of the debt had already been recovered through the compensation money and that the guarantors' remaining mortgaged property secured the balance, the Court modified the DRAT's order to require a reduced pre-deposit of 25% (rather than 50%) of the outstanding amount, to be paid within 8 weeks failing which the appeal would not survive; the related contempt petition was closed as unnecessary since the earlier interim deposit direction had been superseded.
The statutory pre-deposit requirement for appeals under debt-recovery and securitisation laws is mandatory and cannot be waived entirely by a court or tribunal, even where a large sum has already been recovered: at most it can be reduced to the statutory floor (here 25%) for recorded reasons.
