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 moreTwo branches of the same extended family in Karnataka, locked in a decades-old property dispute, clashed in 1995 after a land-survey visit triggered a heated argument. Several family members later returned armed with weapons including a knife, a cycle chain, and homemade bombs, fatally injuring two relatives and wounding several others. The trial court acquitted all eleven accused, reasoning that the prosecution had failed to explain some injuries suffered by the accused themselves. The Karnataka High Court reversed this in part, convicting ten of the accused under Section 304 Part I read with Section 149 IPC (culpable homicide not amounting to murder, committed by an unlawful assembly) and sentencing them to seven years' imprisonment; separate appeals followed, including one by the original complainant seeking a murder conviction and enhanced sentence.
The Supreme Court held the trial court's acquittal was perverse, since it mischaracterized relatively minor, largely self-inflicted injuries on a few of the accused (caused by their own bomb exploding) as a fatal defect in the prosecution's case, despite consistent, mutually corroborating eyewitness and medical evidence establishing their guilt. The Court declined to upgrade the conviction to murder, agreeing that the offence fell within Section 304 Part I given the context of a sudden, escalating family quarrel, but enhanced the sentence from seven to ten years' rigorous imprisonment given the gravity of the injuries (two deaths, several seriously wounded). Two of the accused (Nos. 10 and 12) were acquitted for lack of consistent evidence against them specifically. The accused's own appeals were dismissed, and the complainant's appeal for sentence enhancement was partly allowed.
An appellate court may reverse a trial court's acquittal where its reasoning is shown to be perverse or contrary to cogent, corroborated evidence; and the fact that some accused were themselves injured during an incident (especially through their own actions, like a bomb they were carrying) does not by itself undermine an otherwise strong and consistent prosecution case.
