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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The appellant, whose husband worked abroad, had been living with her father at Kolakkudi and was brought on 18 June 2007 to her mother-in-law's house at Perambalur so that her five-year-old daughter could be schooled there. The prosecution said she resented being made to stay and, on the morning of 21 June 2007 while her mother-in-law had stepped out to buy idlis, strangled the child with the end of her saree; neighbours and relatives found her with the dead child and she was arrested that evening at the Perambalur bus stand. The post-mortem confirmed death by strangulation with a fractured thyroid cartilage. The Sessions Court (Mahila Court, Perambalur) convicted her of murder and sentenced her to life imprisonment, and the Madras High Court affirmed; only her father testified in her defence, claiming she had been with him at Kolakkudi.
The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal. It found the "last seen" circumstance firmly established: independent neighbours (PW-4 and PW-5) as well as family witnesses placed the appellant alone with the child at the time of the incident, and she was arrested in the same town within hours. The father's alibi story was rejected as unproved and inconsistent with the rest of the record. The discrepancies in the 65-year-old mother-in-law's account (whether she took money for idlis, whether the accused ran away) were held to be natural lapses of memory after a year, not grounds to discard the entire prosecution case, applying the principle that minor contradictions do not undermine reliable evidence. Since the child was last seen alive only with the appellant, Section 106 of the Evidence Act required her to explain how the death occurred, and her bare denial under Section 313 CrPC weighed heavily against her. The plea that it was at most culpable homicide due to a quarrel with the mother-in-law was rejected, as a domestic quarrel is not "grave and sudden provocation."
When a victim is last seen alive in the sole custody of the accused and the accused offers no explanation of what happened, the law (Section 106, Evidence Act) lets the court draw the inference against them. An alibi must be proved convincingly by the accused, and small inconsistencies in an elderly witness's testimony will not by themselves rescue an accused where independent witnesses corroborate the core facts.
