Jharkhand High Court Grants Divorce, Says Husband's Demand to Accept Affair as 'Younger Sister' Is Grave Mental Cruelty
The Jharkhand High Court has dissolved a marriage by granting a decree of divorce, ruling that a husband's insistence that his wife accept his affair and live with the other woman as a "younger sister" amounts to mental cruelty of the gravest kind.
The appeal was filed under Section 19(1) of the Family Courts Act, 1984, against an order of the Principal Judge, Family Court, Hazaribagh, which had dismissed the wife's petition under Section 13(1)(i-a) of the Hindu Marriage Act seeking divorce on the ground of cruelty. A Single Bench of Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad and Justice Pradeep Kumar Srivastava allowed the appeal.
The couple, both medical practitioners, married according to Hindu rites and customs and had no children. They lived together at Dhanbad and have been living separately since September 5, 2019. The husband first filed a suit for restitution of conjugal rights before the Family Court, Dhanbad, which was decreed ex parte because the wife did not appear to contest it. The wife then filed a suit for dissolution of marriage on the ground of cruelty.
She alleged that the husband had developed an illicit relationship with a widow. When she protested and the family intervened, he executed a bond assuring that the conduct would not be repeated. Despite that assurance, she said she was later subjected to physical cruelty because of her protest, resulting in grievous assault. The Family Court dismissed her suit, holding that she had disclosed no cause of action and that the suit was not maintainable for the relief sought.
The High Court noted that the wife's testimony showed that soon after the gauna ritual the husband began to ill-treat her, denied her cohabitation at Dhanbad, and repeatedly assaulted her with household implements, causing serious medical conditions such as slip-disc and traumatic osteoarthritis. Her evidence also showed that his relationship with the widow continued despite family intervention and the bond of assurance. The Bench held that his insistence that she accept the relationship and live with the widow as a "younger sister" amounted to mental cruelty of the gravest kind.
The court explained that an appeal under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act lies to the High Court both on facts and on law, and is parallel to Section 96 of the Code of Civil Procedure. It said the word "cruelty" under Section 13(1)(i-a) has no fixed meaning and gives the court wide discretion to apply it contextually, since what is cruelty in one case may not be so in another. Harm or injury to health, reputation or working career are important considerations, and it must be shown that the conduct caused a reasonable apprehension that living with the other spouse would be harmful or injurious.
The Bench found that the Family Court had appreciated the evidence in piecemeal and its finding was perverse, as the pleadings and evidence clearly disclosed cruelty. It observed that the husband's conduct showed mental cruelty through the illicit relationship and had forced the wife to leave her matrimonial home, since it was almost impossible for her to live with him once the thread of trust was broken. Trust is the foundation of marriage, the court said, and once broken it is non-repairable.
The appeal was allowed and the marriage dissolved by a decree of divorce under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.
Source: Verdictum