The Supreme Court on Thursday said the law’s strict provisions were for the benefit of women and did not “punish, threaten, dominate or coerce” their husbands.
Justices BV Nagarathna and Pankaj Mithal observed that Hindu marriage is not considered a “commercial enterprise” but a sacred institution as the foundation of a family.
Notably, the bench observed that the invocation of IPC sections including rape, criminal intimidation and subjecting a married woman to cruelty — as a “combined package” in most complaints related to matrimonial disputes — had been condemned by the Supreme Court on several occasions.
“Women need to be careful that these strict provisions of the law in their hands are beneficial laws for their welfare and not a means of punishing, threatening, dominating or extorting them from their husbands,” he said.
The observations came when the bench dissolved a marriage between an alienated couple on grounds of irretrievable breakdown.
“The provisions in the criminal law are meant for the protection and empowerment of women but are sometimes used by some women for purposes which are not meant for them,” the bench said.
In that case, the husband was ordered to pay Rs 12 crore as permanent alimony to the estranged wife as full and final settlement of all claims within one month.
The bench, however, noted in those cases, where the wife and her family tended to use the criminal complaint for these serious offenses as a platform for negotiation and as a tool to get the husband and his family to meet their demands, which were mostly monetary. Nature.
The police sometimes act in selective cases and arrest husbands or their relatives, and arrest elderly and bedridden parents and grandparents, saying trial courts have refused to grant bail to the accused because of the “seriousness of the crime”. F.I.R.
“The collective impact of this chain of events is often overlooked by the actual individual players involved, which is that even minor squabbles between husbands and wives snowball into ugly freak battles of ego and prestige, and public washing of dirty laundry, eventually leading to reconciliation or cohabitation.” Bitterness is growing in a relationship that doesn’t stand a chance.” said
The Supreme Court referred to a petition earlier filed by the wife seeking transfer of a divorce petition filed under Section 13 (1) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 from a court in Bhopal to a court in Pune. The husband demanded to dissolve the marriage according to Article 142(1) of the Constitution.
The court said that during the short period of their marriage, the parties and their family members were involved in many cases.
The bench said that the marriage did not actually commence at all, observing no continuous cohabitation of the estranged couple.
Taking into account the point of alimony, the court said that the wife claimed that the husband had assets worth Rs 5,000 crore and several businesses and properties in the US and India and paid at least Rs 500 crore to the first wife. Except for a house in Virginia.
“Therefore, she claims permanent alimony as per the status of the respondent-husband and on the same principle as paid to the first wife of the respondent,” the bench observed.
The Supreme Court took serious objection to the tendency of parties to seek maintenance or alimony as equal property to the other party. The bench said that it is often observed that the parties highlight the property, position and income of their spouse in their application for property, position and income of their spouse, and then ask for an amount that may be equivalent to the property of their spouse. “However, there is an anomaly in this practice, as equality is demanded only in cases where the spouse is a person of means or is doing well for himself,” it said.
The bench wondered whether the wife would be willing to seek equity of property if, due to some unfortunate event, after separation, she was made poor. Allowance determination depends on various factors and there can be no straight-jacket formula, it said.
In a joint petition seeking joint dissolution of marriage by decree of mutual divorce, the husband had agreed to pay Rs.8 crores in full and final settlement of all claims.
“The family court, Pune has fixed Rs 10 crore as the amount of permanent allowance to which the petitioner may be entitled. We accept the decision of the family court, Pune. An additional two crore rupees shall be paid to the petitioner to enable him to get another flat…,” the bench said. said The Supreme Court also dismissed the criminal case filed by the wife against the husband.
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