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 1066
Courts will not infer a concluded oral contract for the sale of immovable property just because the other side's witnesses seemed evasive: the party seeking specific performance must independently and affirmatively prove every essential term was genuinely agreed.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1065
Even in serious, high-value corruption cases, prolonged pre-trial detention cannot be used as a substitute for punishment when the trial is unlikely to conclude soon and the evidence is already secured: bail remains the touchstone principle under Article 21's personal liberty protection.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1067
Preventive detention cannot be used as a backdoor way to keep someone in custody once the ordinary criminal process, including bail, has already run its course on the same facts; the detaining authority must show a genuine, independent risk of future harm, not just recycle the criminal case file.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1068
In land acquisition disputes, courts will readily restore a uniform, fair market rate across similarly-situated parcels, but ancillary compensation heads (like moveable equipment such as tubewells) still require the claimant to prove their case with admissible evidence, not private reports whose authors were never examined in court.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8447
If you are injured while genuinely trying to board or exit a train, you are very likely covered under railway "untoward incident" compensation law, even if you technically hadn't fully boarded yet: courts read this protection broadly in favour of passengers, and contemporaneous official records (station logs, police diary entries) carry more weight than a statement taken from you much later.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8404
Courts will not entertain vague, unsubstantiated allegations of judicial bias, and a request to combine cases becomes moot once the other related proceedings have already concluded: genuine grievances about trial delay or procedure must be backed by specific, demonstrable facts, not just repeated litigation.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8403
Anticipatory bail can be granted even in matrimonial cases involving serious sexual-offence allegations where there is unexplained delay in reporting, no evidence substantiating the need for custodial interrogation, and the investigating agency's own conduct (e.g., undocumented "verbal" notices) fails to justify arrest, though this is assessed only for bail purposes, not as a finding on guilt.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8407
In family property disputes, signing a Relinquishment Deed acknowledging receipt of consideration, and then waiting years without challenging it or pursuing your claimed share, will make it very difficult to later prove you were never actually paid; courts expect contemporaneous action (a legal notice, a suit) and corroborating evidence, not delayed assertions alone.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8401
A tenant who claims to have paid a large sum toward an informal "mortgage" or side arrangement must be able to prove it with solid evidence (receipts, corroborating witnesses): bare assertions, especially when contradicted by one's own family members under cross-examination, will not defeat a landlord's claim for rent and possession.
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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.
An arbitral tribunal passed an ex-parte award on 12 March 1998 in favour of Alpine Housing, directing specific performance of a land agreement subject to the amalgamation of certain plots; the respondents (Dhariwal and others) had led no evidence before the arbitrators. They challenged the award under Section 34 before the City Civil Court, Bengaluru, and applied to place on record a later communication from the municipal authority refusing permission to amalgamate the plots, arguing that this made the award contrary to public policy and incapable of execution. The Section 34 court refused to allow any evidence, but the Karnataka High Court reversed that and permitted the respondents to file affidavits, relying on the Supreme Court's decision in Fiza Developers. The award-holder appealed.
The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal. It reaffirmed the law from Fiza Developers, Emkay Global and Canara Nidhi: a Section 34 challenge is a summary proceeding, no issues need be framed, and it will "not ordinarily require anything beyond the record that was before the arbitrator", but in exceptional cases, matters not on that record and relevant to the grounds of challenge may be brought in by affidavits, with cross-examination only if absolutely necessary. The Court rejected the argument that a "public policy" objection under Section 34(2)(b) can never require evidence, and also rejected the suggestion that such an objection must wait for execution proceedings: conflict with public policy is itself a ground to set aside an award. Here, the refusal of amalgamation was an event after the award, so it could not have been on the arbitral record, and the award itself had been passed ex-parte with no evidence from the respondents; that made out a "strong exceptional case" for allowing affidavits. The Court permitted the appellant to cross-examine and lead contrary evidence, and directed the Section 34 court to decide the matter expeditiously.
A court hearing a challenge to an arbitral award normally decides only on the record that was before the arbitrator, but where a genuinely new and relevant fact arises after the award (or the award was passed without the challenger's evidence), the court can allow affidavits so that justice is not defeated by procedure, while still keeping the process quick.
