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 1066
Courts will not infer a concluded oral contract for the sale of immovable property just because the other side's witnesses seemed evasive: the party seeking specific performance must independently and affirmatively prove every essential term was genuinely agreed.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1065
Even in serious, high-value corruption cases, prolonged pre-trial detention cannot be used as a substitute for punishment when the trial is unlikely to conclude soon and the evidence is already secured: bail remains the touchstone principle under Article 21's personal liberty protection.
Criminal Appeal · 2026 INSC 1067
Preventive detention cannot be used as a backdoor way to keep someone in custody once the ordinary criminal process, including bail, has already run its course on the same facts; the detaining authority must show a genuine, independent risk of future harm, not just recycle the criminal case file.
Civil Appeal · 2026 INSC 1068
In land acquisition disputes, courts will readily restore a uniform, fair market rate across similarly-situated parcels, but ancillary compensation heads (like moveable equipment such as tubewells) still require the claimant to prove their case with admissible evidence, not private reports whose authors were never examined in court.
First Appeal from Order · 2026:DHC:8447
If you are injured while genuinely trying to board or exit a train, you are very likely covered under railway "untoward incident" compensation law, even if you technically hadn't fully boarded yet: courts read this protection broadly in favour of passengers, and contemporaneous official records (station logs, police diary entries) carry more weight than a statement taken from you much later.
Writ Petition (Criminal) · 2026:DHC:8404
Courts will not entertain vague, unsubstantiated allegations of judicial bias, and a request to combine cases becomes moot once the other related proceedings have already concluded: genuine grievances about trial delay or procedure must be backed by specific, demonstrable facts, not just repeated litigation.
Bail Application · 2026:DHC:8403
Anticipatory bail can be granted even in matrimonial cases involving serious sexual-offence allegations where there is unexplained delay in reporting, no evidence substantiating the need for custodial interrogation, and the investigating agency's own conduct (e.g., undocumented "verbal" notices) fails to justify arrest, though this is assessed only for bail purposes, not as a finding on guilt.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8407
In family property disputes, signing a Relinquishment Deed acknowledging receipt of consideration, and then waiting years without challenging it or pursuing your claimed share, will make it very difficult to later prove you were never actually paid; courts expect contemporaneous action (a legal notice, a suit) and corroborating evidence, not delayed assertions alone.
Regular First Appeal · 2026:DHC:8401
A tenant who claims to have paid a large sum toward an informal "mortgage" or side arrangement must be able to prove it with solid evidence (receipts, corroborating witnesses): bare assertions, especially when contradicted by one's own family members under cross-examination, will not defeat a landlord's claim for rent and possession.
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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.
Several traders (including Ecom Gill Coffee Trading, which bought green coffee beans, and other purchasing dealers who bought readymade garments) claimed Input Tax Credit (ITC), a tax rebate for tax already paid on goods bought for resale, under the Karnataka VAT Act. Tax authorities disallowed the ITC after finding that many of the sellers involved were deregistered, had filed "NIL" returns, or had denied making the sales at all, suggesting the transactions may not have been genuine. The traders argued they had done nothing wrong because they held valid invoices and had paid by cheque, and the appellate tribunal and the Karnataka High Court agreed with them, restoring the ITC. The State of Karnataka then appealed to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court held that Section 70 of the KVAT Act places the burden of proving an ITC claim squarely on the purchasing dealer, and that this burden does not shift to the tax department merely because invoices exist. The Court ruled that producing a tax invoice or showing payment by cheque is not, by itself, sufficient proof of a genuine purchase: a buyer must also show the actual physical movement of goods, such as the seller's details, transport/vehicle records, freight payment, and proof of taking delivery. Since none of the dealers in this batch of cases had produced this additional evidence, and the tax officer's doubts about the sellers (deregistered, non-filing, or denying the sale) were well-founded, the Court held the ITC claims were rightly rejected at the first stage. It set aside the High Court and tribunal orders and restored the original denial of ITC by the assessing officer.
A business claiming input tax credit cannot rely only on an invoice and a cheque payment. It must be able to prove that goods genuinely and physically moved from seller to buyer, since the law places the full burden of proving a transaction's genuineness on the party claiming the tax benefit.
