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.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1094
An older qualification must still satisfy the eligibility rules governing the appointment sought. Here, the certificate's early date did not secure reinstatement, and rejection of eligibility should not be confused with a conclusive finding that the certificate was forged.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1095
A party benefiting from a conditional stay must meet its deposit requirement or face enforcement. The additional ₹15 crore deposit secures the pending dispute; it does not settle the land's final compensation or amount to an immediate payment to the landowners.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1093
An alleged attempt to kill does not become a lesser offence simply because the victim avoided a fatal injury. Restoring this charge means the accusation must be tried; it does not establish that the accused is guilty.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1090
For the assessment in this case, assistance reducing ordinary manufacturing costs was taxable even though the government wanted to encourage industry. The purpose and actual operation of the particular subsidy mattered more than its general development label.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1091
Proof that someone caused a serious injury does not by itself prove the additional ingredients of robbery. A court can substitute a lesser offence supported by the evidence; the sentencing reduction here depended on Appa's particular circumstances.
Special Leave Petition (Civil) · 2026 INSC 1092
Someone challenging an election must ensure that the personal-presentation requirement is met and can be proved. Merely entering the court building does not establish compliance, and a filing defect can end the challenge before the election allegations are examined.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1088
An employee who retires on 30 June may be entitled to the increment that falls due on 1 July after completing a year of service. Authorities that delay paying the amounts due must pay interest after the deadline set by the court.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1089
Recruitment must follow the qualifications stated in the advertisement and the governing Recruitment Rules. A court will not override a merit-based eligibility decision made under those rules merely because the candidate concerned was higher in the written test.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8797
A person who occupied property only because of employment has no independent right to remain once the employment and decree end. Even when a petition fails, courts can make practical arrangements to let a person recover personal belongings.
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Log in to see moreThe appellants were Judicial Officers initially appointed to temporary "Fast Track Courts" set up (under Supreme Court directions in Brij Mohan Lal v. Union of India) to clear case backlogs in Jharkhand, and after nearly a decade of service were later absorbed into the regular Higher Judicial Service through a special examination process mandated by the Supreme Court. The State of Jharkhand treated them as fresh recruits for pension purposes, refusing to count their years of Fast Track Court service toward their pensionary and retiral benefits. Their writ petitions challenging this were dismissed by the Jharkhand High Court, which reasoned that it could not grant anything beyond what the Supreme Court itself had ordered under Article 142.
The Supreme Court held that nothing in its earlier judgments (Brij Mohan Lal or Mahesh Chandra Verma's own prior round) had prohibited counting Fast Track Court service for pension purposes: the High Court had wrongly read a prohibition into silence. The Court noted the appellants were appointed to these courts strictly on merit (from the same selection process as the regular cadre, just not high enough on the list at the time), served for about a decade to the satisfaction of the judicial system, and that the State's own failure to create sufficient regular cadre posts, not any fault of the appellants, necessitated the Fast Track Court scheme in the first place. Drawing an analogy to a prior ruling on regularising Special Police Officers in Punjab, the Court held it would be unjust to let the State's own staffing shortfall be used as a reason to deny these officers credit for years of genuine judicial service.
When the government itself creates a stop-gap employment scheme because it has failed to sanction enough regular posts, it cannot later penalize the employees who filled that gap by denying them service credit: years of bona fide work performed to fill a government-created need must count toward pension and retiral benefits upon regularisation.
