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.
Following the Supreme Court's 2020 judgment on control of the historic Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Kerala, the Court had directed a 25-year special audit of the Temple's finances. The Temple's Administrative Committee reported a severe COVID-19-driven financial crisis and difficulty getting the separate Sree Padmanabha Swamy Temple Trust (SPSTT) to hand over its accounts, while SPSTT filed its own application asking to be declared a wholly independent entity exempt from that audit.
The Court held that its original 2020 audit direction, read together with the Amicus Curiae's 2014 report and the Trust's own past conduct of cooperating with a court-appointed auditor, was always intended to cover SPSTT's accounts and not just the Temple's own books. It therefore rejected SPSTT's request to be excluded from the audit, declined to separately rule on SPSTT's broader claim of independence (leaving that for later determination after the audit), and disposed of SPSTT's application on those terms. Given the urgency described in the Committee's report, the Court directed that the special audit of both the Temple and SPSTT be completed within three months.
When a court orders an institution to be audited, a closely linked trust or entity cannot avoid that audit merely by asserting it is a separate legal entity: if the audit's purpose was understood from the outset to include it, that scope will be enforced.
