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.
In October 2003, ABP Pvt. Ltd. imported a high-speed cold-set web offset printing machine, relying on a customs notification granting a concessional 5% duty rate on such machines with a minimum speed of 70,000 copies/hour. Before the machine arrived, the government amended the notification to restrict the concession only to "double width four plate" machines, excluding the "single width two plate" type ABP had imported, making ABP liable for full customs duty of about Rs. 1.92 crore instead of the concessional rate. ABP challenged the amendment in the Calcutta High Court as arbitrary, and both the Single Judge and the Division Bench ruled in ABP's favour, holding there was no rational basis ("intelligible differentia") to treat the two machine types differently since neither was manufactured in India at comparable capacity. The Union of India appealed to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court held that the power to grant, modify, or withdraw a customs exemption under Section 25(1) of the Customs Act is a matter of fiscal/economic policy squarely within the executive's domain, and courts should not conduct a "merits review" of such decisions: judicial review is limited to checking whether the decision is backed by relevant reasons, is bona fide, and free of illegality, not whether the reasoning is wise or sufficient. Reviewing precedents (Indian Express Newspapers, Kasinka Trading, Bannari Amman Sugars), the Court found that the government's stated reason, protecting domestic manufacturers who could produce similar (though somewhat lower-capacity) machines, was a legitimate "indigenous angle" consideration, and was not irrelevant or mala fide merely because the specific imported machine had no exact domestic equivalent. The Court held the High Court had overstepped by second-guessing the adequacy of this economic rationale rather than merely checking its relevance and bona fides, and that no vested right or promissory estoppel arises from a tax concession that was never promised to continue indefinitely. Accordingly, the Amended Notification was held valid, the High Court's judgment set aside, and the Union's appeal allowed with no order as to costs.
Government decisions on tax and customs exemptions are policy matters where courts will only check for bad faith, irrelevance, or illegality in the reasoning, not whether the policy choice was the wisest one, and businesses cannot claim a permanent right to a tax concession that was never promised to last forever.
