9.1 How to Study the Prescribed Cases (the Method)

The case-answer's craft (the exam's discipline): the IRAC structure — the Issues (the interpretive question: which rule/construction/presumption was in dispute?), the Rule (the interpretive canon or statutory provision invoked), the Application (how the court construed the words — the aids used, the construction chosen), the Conclusion (the holding + the interpretive principle distilled). The NKP report's anatomy: the decision number (D.N.), the NKP year (B.S.), the page, the bench, the parties, the facts-summary (the "facts-purvaka"), the discussions (the "dhirdhara"), the order (the "adesh"). Reading the prescribed cases from the NKP itself is the syllabus's own direction — the reports' exact wording is the authoritative source. The honest note (these notes' method): the five cases below are reported with their exact citations from the official syllabus; the era-and-court context and the interpretive questions each era's jurisprudence typically posed are given as the study-frame; the detailed facts-and-holdings must be taken from the NKP reports themselves — the syllabus directs the reading, and the reports are the source (these notes do not invent facts).