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.
The Tamil Nadu Teachers Recruitment Board held a written exam in 2017 to select Lecturers for Government Polytechnic Colleges. After the results came out, a complaint alleged large-scale tampering of OMR answer sheets, and an investigation found that marks of 196 candidates had been fraudulently altered by an employee of the evaluation agency in exchange for money. The Board cancelled the entire examination rather than just the tainted results, which was challenged in multiple writ petitions before the Madras High Court with conflicting outcomes, eventually reaching a Division Bench that ruled in favour of the candidates and restored the process (minus only the 196 tainted candidates).
The Supreme Court set aside the Division Bench's ruling and restored the Board's decision to cancel the entire examination. It held that when there is credible material showing large-scale malpractice pervading an examination, the authority conducting it is entitled to cancel the whole process rather than being confined to removing only the identified wrongdoers, and that courts exercising judicial review should not second-guess the sufficiency of such material if the decision was bona fide. It also criticised a High Court Single Judge for taking a view contrary to another coordinate-strength Single Judge's earlier ruling on the same issue instead of referring the conflict to a larger Bench.
When an examination's integrity is genuinely compromised by large-scale fraud, the conducting authority can cancel the entire exam, even if that inconveniences innocent candidates, rather than being forced to surgically segregate only the proven wrongdoers.
