Landmark Judgments

464 Supreme Court judgments from 1950 to 2026, chosen from the cases our judiciary, CLAT and AIBE questions cite most. Each digest gives the facts, the questions before the Court, what it held and passages in the Court's own words, with a link to the official judgment.

Judgments: 464
Constitution Benches: 139
Subjects: 27

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Subject

Decided in

BenchAct interpretedMy listOverruled or explained by a later case here

21 of 464 judgments

Abdul Rajik v. State of Madhya Pradesh2026Evidence2 judges
Convictions for possessing charas were set aside: without an unbroken chain of custody of the samples the FSL report was discarded, and a burning test at the spot could…
Pooranmal v. State of Rajasthan2026Evidence3 judges
The Court acquitted the appellant of murder because call detail records without a Section 65-B certificate were inadmissible and the recoveries of currency and a…
Neeraj Dutta v. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi)2022Evidence5-judge bench
If the complainant's direct evidence of a bribe demand is unavailable, demand and acceptance can be proved by other oral, documentary or circumstantial evidence, and…
Arjun Panditrao Khotkar v. Kailash Kushanrao Gorantyal2020Evidence3 judges
A certificate under Section 65B(4), Evidence Act is a condition precedent to admitting secondary evidence of an electronic record; Anvar P.V. was affirmed as clarified,…
Shafhi Mohammad v. State of Himachal Pradesh2018Evidence2 judgesLater case in library
A party producing electronic evidence who is not in possession of the device cannot be required to produce a certificate under Section 65B(4) of the Evidence Act; the…
Tomaso Bruno v. State of Uttar Pradesh2015Evidence3 judges
Conviction for murder based on circumstantial evidence set aside. The prosecution's failure to produce available CCTV footage, the best evidence, raised serious doubt…
Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer2014Evidence3 judgesLater case in library
Secondary evidence of an electronic record is admissible only with a certificate under Section 65B(4) of the Evidence Act; Navjot Sandhu was overruled on this point, and…
Nandlal Wasudeo Badwaik v. Lata Nandlal Badwaik2014Evidence2 judges
Holding that an accurate DNA test report prevails over the conclusive presumption of legitimacy under Section 112 of the Evidence Act, the Court set aside maintenance…
State (NCT of Delhi) v. Navjot Sandhu2005Evidence2 judgesLater case in library
In the Parliament attack case the Court held a POTA confession inadmissible against co-accused, upheld Mohd. Afzal's conviction and death sentence, convicted Shaukat…
Roop Kumar v. Mohan Thedani2003Evidence2 judges
The Court explained Sections 91 and 92 of the Evidence Act, held that the written agency-cum-licence agreement had been acted upon and was not a sham, and upheld the…
State of Maharashtra v. Dr. Praful B. Desai2003Evidence2 judges
Evidence in a criminal trial may be recorded by video conferencing; so long as the accused or his pleader is present, it is evidence taken in the presence of the accused…
Laxman v. State of Maharashtra2002Evidence5-judge bench
A dying declaration recorded by a magistrate satisfied of the declarant's fitness can be acted upon without a doctor's certificate of fitness, if the court holds it…
Paparambaka Rosamma v. State of Andhra Pradesh1999Evidence3 judgesLater case in library
The Court set aside convictions under Sections 498-A and 302 IPC that rested only on a dying declaration, because the doctor certified only that the injured was…
Goutam Kundu v. State of West Bengal1993Evidence2 judges
Courts in India cannot order a blood group test as a matter of course; the husband must first make out a strong prima facie case of non-access to displace the…
Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra1984Evidence3 judges
The Court set aside the appellant's conviction and death sentence for poisoning his wife, holding that circumstantial evidence must satisfy the five conditions drawn…
Pyare Lal Bhargava v. State of Rajasthan1962Evidence4 judges
The Court upheld a conviction for theft of a government file taken home overnight and returned, holding that temporary deprivation causes wrongful loss, and restated the…
H. Venkatachala Iyengar v. B.N. Thimmajamma1958Evidence3 judges
The propounder of a will must prove its due execution and the testator's sound disposing mind, and must remove any suspicious circumstances by cogent evidence. The will…
Khushal Rao v. State of Bombay1957Evidence3 judges
The Court held that no absolute rule of law or prudence requires a dying declaration to be corroborated before it can found a conviction, and upheld the appellant's…
Shambu Nath Mehra v. State of Ajmer1956Evidence2 judges
Section 106 of the Evidence Act does not relieve the prosecution of its burden of proof; it applies only to facts especially within the accused's knowledge, not facts…
Palvinder Kaur v. State of Punjab1952Evidence3 judges
The Court acquitted the appellant under Section 201 IPC, holding that her wholly exculpatory statement was not a confession and was inadmissible, that a confession…

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How these pages are written

Every digest is written from the judgment itself, taken from the Supreme Court's own website (sci.gov.in), and links to that file.
Quoted passages are copied from the official text and were checked against it word for word; each gives the page of the PDF.
Where the bench split, the holdings given are the majority's. Where a later judgment in this library overrules or explains a case, that case's page says so, quoting the later Court's words.
A digest is a study aid. Read the judgment before citing it.

Test yourself

170 practice questions on landmark judgments, with explanations.

All 464 judgments, A to Z