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 appellant held a wholesale liquor (F.L.-1) license in Mahe, one of the four regions of the Union Territory of Puducherry, and applied to shift its licensed shop roughly 650 km away to Karaikal, another region of the same Union Territory. A local resident objected, arguing that the rules only permitted shifting a shop within the same local area, not across an entire region, relying on an earlier single-judge High Court ruling. The Excise authorities nonetheless granted permission for the shift, but the Madras High Court's Division Bench quashed that permission, holding that the word "place" in the relevant Excise Rules had a restrictive meaning confined to the shop's existing locality.
The Supreme Court held that the Puducherry Excise Act and Rules nowhere restrict shifting a licensed shop to within the same local area, region, or commune: the word "place" in Rule 209 simply described the type of premises (house, building, shop, etc.), not a territorial limit, and the legislature had used a distinctly different term, "local area," elsewhere in the Act whenever it actually intended to confine movement to a locality. Given Puducherry's unusual geography of four physically disconnected regions, the Court held it would defeat the statute's purpose to read in a region-based restriction that the text did not contain, especially since the authorities had already permitted similar shop relocations across regions in the past and had independently verified that the new site raised no highway-proximity, institutional-proximity, or law-and-order concerns. Finding the shifting permission valid and all statutory conditions complied with, the Court allowed the appeals and set aside the High Court's judgment.
When interpreting licensing or regulatory rules, courts will look at how the statute uses its own terms consistently: if the law uses a different, more restrictive phrase ("local area") elsewhere when it actually means to confine something geographically, a broader term used in another provision should not be read as carrying the same restriction unless the text says so.
