Have a Heart Foundation (Sales & Mktng) 18 March 2014

Court pulls up wife fr denying father access to son 23 times

Court pulls up woman for denying man access to son 23 times in 2 yrs

By Sharmeen Hakim Indorewala, Mumbai Mirror | Mar 18, 2014, 03.11 AM IST

A family court struck down a woman's defense in a custody case for denying the father access to their minor son on 23 different occasions in two years, despite court orders allowing him to see the child once a week.

"One parent cannot become over possessive of the child and deprive the child of the love and affection of the other non-custodian parent," principal judge of the family court Laxmi Rao observed, while delivering the interim order. A businessman from Thane had approached the court in 2010 for custody of his one-and-a-half-year old old son.

He claimed that his wife had accused him in a fake dowry harassment case and had kept his son away from him since the time the child was an infant.

The court had orally directed the mother to allow the father access to child at the premises of an NGO Stree Mukti Sanghatana at Parel, every Saturday for two hours.

The businessman told the court his wife denied him access to the child several times and had also used the child "as a pawn", making him cry during his meetings with him, with an intent to file a false complaint against him and malign his image before the court. The man also claimed his wife did not want one of the NGO volunteers to be a witness in the case as the volunteer knew about the relationship he shared with his son and would tell the court the truth. In March 2012 after having being denied access to his son on several occasions, the court granted the businessman permission to meet the toddler for two hours every Wednesday and Saturday.

The father told the court of 23 instances when he was not allowed to meet his son. "On one occasion I was told that my son felt like going to the zoo and on another, the aquarium and that is why I cannot meet him even though I volunteered to just tag along.

"On Father's Day, my son was tutored to say he did not want to come to me. I showed the court photographs and videos of every single meeting before that day where we were happy together. On another occasion my wife sent me a message saying it was my sons sports (day) and he was a little unwell, so access would not be possible; the same day I called school only to find out that he was perfectly ok, had got done before court proceedings even started, his school being in the vicinity."

"Her attitude is not only causing immense agony and trauma to me by not being able to spend quality time with my son, but the poor child is being harassed and told to lie that he does not want to meet the father," said the man.

The mother did not file any reply to her husband's application asking that her defense be struck down; she cited lack of time.

"(The) respondent is admittedly not giving access to the petitioner father from time to time and specially on 23 dates as listed out by him. I find that striking off the defence would be a very harsh order to be passed at this stage but the respondent will have to bear in mind that by her not giving access of the child to the father as per the Court's order I am left with no option but to strike off the defence of the respondent. If such approach is encouraged, it would bring lot of unrest in the society and the justice delivery system would loose its meaning," the judge observed.

The order would mean that the mother's written statement opposing the child's father's written statement cannot be taken into account with the documents she has supporting her claim, said a lawyer. But it is an order that can be further challenged.