Statistics

The Supreme Court judgments that Indian courts cite most, counted

Pundora · Published 3 October 2026 · Updated 25 October 2026

Which judgments do Indian courts actually cite? Counted across the 1.89 crore judgments Pundora holds in full text: 33 Supreme Court decisions, the number of judgments in which each is cited, and what the list says about the work the High Courts do.

The list

What the list shows

• The most-cited judgments are about procedure in criminal matters, not constitutional doctrine. 7 of the 33 are the line of authority on quashing criminal proceedings after the parties settle; 8 are on bail, anticipatory bail or arrest. The landmark constitutional cases that fill textbooks are far down a list ordered by what courts cite day to day.
• Motor accident compensation has its own canon. Sarla Verma, Pranay Sethi and Magma General Insurance are each cited in thousands of judgments, the arithmetic of compensation applied claim after claim.
• One citation dominates. Gian Singh is cited in 67,850 judgments, half as many again as the next.
• A 2025 judgment is already on the list. Celestium Financial, decided in April 2025, is cited in 9,129 judgments within nineteen months.

How this was counted, and what it does not show

• The count. Pundora has read every judgment it holds and recorded each citation written inside it (1,38,73,301 on 29 October 2026). On 25 October 2026 those were grouped by citation, and each citation’s count is the number of distinct judgments in which it appears.
• One reporter at a time. A judgment cited as (2012) 10 SCC 303 in one place and under another reporter elsewhere is counted here under the first only. Every figure is therefore a floor: the true number of judgments citing the case is higher.
• Every name was checked. The name written beside a citation in a judgment is often abbreviated or wrong. Each case named here was found in Pundora’s Supreme Court corpus by both parties’ names within the years the report could cover; the date and the neutral and Supreme Court Reports citations are that record’s. Citations whose case could not be confirmed that way are left out, among them several that would otherwise rank (a citation for State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, and one for Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India).
• High Court judgments cited by High Courts are not in this table. Several Allahabad and Patna High Court decisions are cited tens of thousands of times within their own courts; this page lists Supreme Court judgments only.
• The corpus is what the courts publish electronically: recent decades are far better covered than earlier ones, and the High Courts that upload the most orders weigh the most. The subject labels beside the list are our short description, not the court’s.

Counted in Pundora’s own corpus on the date shown. Each named case is confirmed against the Supreme Court judgments Pundora holds; a correction sent to contact@pundora.in is made and dated.