Lucknow: The Allahabad High Court has underscored the need for caution in characterising minor disputes in marriages as “cruelty” under divorce laws, emphasising that such a classification could lead to the dissolution of matrimonial relationships without actual cruelty being committed by either spouse.
The division bench of Justice Saumitra Dayal Singh and Justice Shiv Shanker Prasad made this observation while directing the judicial separation of an estranged couple from Ghaziabad, instead of immediately granting a divorce.
The case involved a couple married in 2013, where the husband alleged that the wife refused to consummate the marriage, engaged in conflicts with his parents, incited a mob against him, and filed a dowry case. Despite living together until July 2014, they did not cohabit thereafter, leading the husband to seek a divorce citing cruelty by the wife. The wife countered by accusing her husband of having an extramarital relationship with his sister-in-law.
The family court initially rejected the divorce plea, prompting an appeal to the Allahabad high court.
The HC cautioned against interpreting minor incidents as cruelty, stating that doing so could expose many marriages to dissolution without genuine cruelty. It emphasised that for an act to qualify as marital cruelty, it must be significant enough to hinder reconciliation efforts. The court also addressed the wife’s accusation of an illicit relationship based on the husband sharing a room with his sister-in-law and her children, deeming such an inference unjustified.
While acknowledging serious disputes between the spouses and the lack of consummation in their marriage, the court opted for judicial separation instead of an immediate dissolution.
