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.
Transfer Petition (Criminal) · 2026 INSC 1060
Where a marriage has irretrievably broken down and the parties reach a genuine, voluntary settlement, including on alimony, the Supreme Court can use its Article 142 powers to grant a mutual-consent divorce and close out all related litigation in one stroke, without requiring the usual statutory waiting period.
Writ Petition (Civil) · 2026 INSC 1061
In long-running, complex litigation involving apportioned government liabilities across states, the Supreme Court can use a mechanism like a retired-judge committee plus periodic compliance affidavits to bring genuine finality, including firm timelines, transparency obligations, and interest for delayed payment, rather than leaving matters open-ended.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1062
In an "as is where is" liquidation auction, a bidder who voluntarily accepts the auction terms cannot later resile from a forfeiture clause by citing regulatory caps or after-the-fact excuses for non-payment: courts will enforce the auction notice's own conditions.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8338-DB
Once someone is released from custody because the police failed to properly communicate the grounds of arrest, the police cannot simply re-arrest them by adding new charges: a specific, court-supervised procedure with senior-officer accountability must be followed, or the re-arrest itself becomes illegal.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8308
In economic-offence cases, bail can still be granted where the method used to quantify the alleged financial evasion is not adequately justified, and where the apprehension of re-offending is speculative rather than evidence-based.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8323
A parole claim must be backed by a genuine, verifiable application to the competent jail authority: courts will scrutinise irregularities like an incomplete address, an unexplained thumb mark, or reliance on a mere friend's affidavit rather than close family.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8337
Courts can grant short, strictly time-bound interim bail purely on humanitarian/compassionate grounds (such as caring for a seriously ill family member), even while a case remains pending trial and an earlier bail plea has failed.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8312
Courts will not repeatedly re-examine a bail plea already rejected on merits unless the applicant can point to a genuine change in circumstances since the earlier order.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8334
Under the no-fault compensation scheme for railway accidents, a valid ticket-holder injured while attempting to board a train, even carelessly, is generally entitled to compensation unless the railway can show a deliberate, conscious exposure to danger, not mere negligence.
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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.
The appellant's husband was Vice-Chancellor of Alliance University, and she herself briefly held that post. A criminal case alleged that one Madhukar Angur collected about Rs. 107 crores from students by falsely posing as the University's Chancellor. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) later filed a money-laundering complaint naming the appellant as an accused, alleging she helped Angur launder the proceeds by having two properties registered in her name using a nominal sale arrangement. She was not named as an accused in any of the underlying criminal cases (the "scheduled offences"): the only common thread was a charge of criminal conspiracy under Section 120-B of the Indian Penal Code, which by itself is listed in the PMLA's Schedule of offences.
The Supreme Court held that a person need not be an accused in the underlying scheduled offence to face a money-laundering charge, and rejected the argument that the first property (bought in 2013, before the alleged fraud even began) had no link to the crime, though it left open for trial whether the second property was bought using tainted money. However, the Court ruled decisively on the key legal question: Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) only counts as a "scheduled offence" under PMLA if the conspiracy alleged is to commit an offence that is itself already listed in the PMLA Schedule, not any and every offence. Since none of the underlying chargesheets against Angur alleged conspiracy to commit a scheduled offence, there was no valid scheduled offence against the appellant at all, and her prosecution under the PMLA could not proceed. The complaint against her was quashed and the appeal allowed.
Merely invoking the general conspiracy provision (Section 120-B IPC) cannot be used to sweep any and every non-scheduled crime into the strict and stringent framework of the anti-money-laundering law: the underlying conspiracy must specifically target an offence that Parliament has actually chosen to list as triggering PMLA action.
