A year of second thoughts: How Supreme Court reversed key orders within months in 2025

On Monday, which was the last working day of the top court this year, the SC stayed its own ruling about the Aravalli hills definition

• Supreme Court overturned several 2025 decisions, including Aravalli hills ruling.
• SC allows stray dogs' release post vaccination and deworming.
• Court flagged concern over frequent overturning of its own verdicts

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The year 2025 saw the Supreme Court reverse its own decisions within a span of months.

On Monday, which was the last working day of the top court this year, the SC stayed its own ruling about the Aravalli hills definition just 40 days after that judgment was delivered.

A three-member bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant stayed its own November 20 order that accepted a 100-metre height definition for the Aravalli Hills, and decided to form a High-Powered Expert Committee with domain experts to resolve all critical ambiguities.

The other notable decisions overturned by the top court this year are as follows:

Stray dogs menace

On August 22, the court modified its earlier suo moto directive mandating the confinement of all stray dogs in shelters across the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) and prohibiting their release.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath, Sandeep Mehta, and NV Anjaria clarified that stray dogs may now be released back into their original places of habitation after being dewormed and vaccinated. On August 11, the court had directed the civic authorities to round up all stray dogs within eight weeks and keep them in dedicated shelters, with no re-release onto the streets.

Bhushan Steel insolvency case

In September, the top court overturned its May 2 order directing liquidation of Bhushan Power and Steel Ltd (BPSL) and instead upheld JSW Steel Ltd’s Rs 19,700 crore resolution plan for the debt-ridden company. With this verdict, SC effectively rejected challenges raised by BPSL's former promoters and certain creditors.

Vanashakti review

In November, the court recalled its May 16 judgment that had prohibited the Centre from granting retrospective environmental clearances to projects found violating environmental norms.

By a 2:1 majority, a bench of then Chief Justice of India BR Gavai, Justice Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice K Vinod Chandran revived the legal mechanism that allowed ex-post facto environmental clearances for projects that had commenced or expanded without prior approvals under the 2006 Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) notification.

Top court flags trend

The top court has  flagged a growing trend in which verdicts pronounced by judges, are being overturned by succeeding benches or specially constituted benches at the behest of some party aggrieved by the verdicts.

"The object of Article 141 of the Constitution seems to be this: the pronouncement of a verdict by a bench on a particular issue of law (arising out of the facts involved) should settle the controversy, being final, and has to be followed by all courts as law declared by the Supreme Court,'' a bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Augustine George Masih said.

The court said if a verdict is allowed to be reopened because a later different view appears to be better, the very purpose of enacting Article 141 would stand defeated.