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.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1073
In circumstantial-evidence cases, forensic and DNA evidence must actually corroborate the alleged crime: a conviction cannot survive where the most crucial scientific evidence, on its own terms, points away from rather than toward the prosecution's theory.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1074
A conviction based purely on circumstantial evidence requires every link in the chain, timeline, witness credibility, forensic matches, and motive, to be proven beyond reasonable doubt; gaps or suppressed evidence at any link entitle the accused to the benefit of the doubt, even in a serious case like a double murder.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8505
Courts will not quash a criminal case merely because the accused has a plausible alibi-type defence; unless that defence is conclusive and undisputed, the matter must be tested through the ordinary trial process.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8547
A private compromise between victim and accused cannot by itself secure quashing of a case involving serious, heinous allegations like attempted murder with a weapon: such matters must proceed to trial regardless of settlement.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8563
Railway Claims Tribunals cannot reject a bona fide passenger's death claim based on speculative inferences when there is no direct evidence of an alternative cause of death; the compensation scheme under the Railways Act is to be interpreted generously in favour of victims' families.
Criminal Miscellaneous Case · 2026:DHC:8559
In matrimonial offences, courts can and do quash criminal proceedings once a genuine compromise is verified directly with the complainant, sparing both parties a prolonged and pointless trial.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8541
A co-accused's bail does not automatically extend to another accused where their actual roles in the offence differ materially; delay caused by one's own defence counsel cannot later be used as a ground for bail.
Execution Petition · 2026:DHC:8567
An arbitral award must be adequately stamped before a court can enforce it; courts give only a limited window to cure such defects, after which the award becomes legally unusable until the deficiency is fixed.
Arbitration Petition · 2026:DHC:8555
A genuine settlement reached through mediation renders a pending arbitration-related court petition moot, allowing parties to close out litigation quickly once they resolve their dispute privately.
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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.
A father-in-law, Satish Chander Ahuja, owned a house in New Delhi where his son and daughter-in-law, Sneha Ahuja, lived after their marriage. After the marriage broke down and the son moved out, the father-in-law sued his daughter-in-law for a mandatory and permanent injunction to make her vacate the property, claiming it was his exclusive self-acquired property. The trial court decreed in his favour, but the Delhi High Court set that aside and sent the matter back for fresh trial, holding that the daughter-in-law's claim to a "shared household" under the Domestic Violence Act needed to be examined. The father-in-law appealed to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court used this case to clarify the definition of "shared household" under Section 2(s) of the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005. It held that a shared household is not limited to a house owned or rented by the husband or belonging to his joint family: it can also include a house owned exclusively by the husband's relatives (such as his parents), provided the wife actually lived there in a domestic relationship with some degree of permanency. In doing so, the Court narrowed the earlier, more restrictive view taken in S.R. Batra v. Taruna Batra. However, on the facts of this specific case, the Court agreed with the High Court that the dispute over whether this particular property was a "shared household" needed to be decided on evidence at trial, and therefore dismissed the appeal, upholding the remand to the trial court.
A daughter-in-law's right of residence under the Domestic Violence Act can extend even to a house that is the self-acquired, exclusive property of her in-laws, not just a house owned by her husband, but whether that right actually applies still depends on the specific facts of how and where the couple lived.
