JAIPUR: The Rajasthan High Court on Tuesday turned down the request of a woman, who lived separately from her husband for 15 years, that she shall be allowed to live with him again. The court, while granting divorce to her doctor husband after 18 years of litigation, said that her demand leads to the obvious conclusion that she has had resolved to live in agony only to make the life a miserable one.
The observation of the division bench comprising Justice Dalip Singh and Justice Meena V Gomber came while rejecting an appeal filed by a woman, Rekha, a law graduate, against the decree of divorce granted by family court no. 2, Jaipur in favour of her husband holding her guilty of committing cruelty.
The husband, Mohanlal Wadhwani, a doctor working at SMS Hospital, got married to Rekha in 1994. The marriage was short lived and within two years, they started living separately.
However, the two parties reached a compromise in 2000 and a son was born to them in April 2001. They again got separated in 2002 and remained so ever since.
"When the husband approached the family court for divorce in 1995, he along with his relatives were booked in false cases under Section 498 A and 406 of IPC for dowry demand, resulting in his arrest and harassment of his relatives," said Lalit Sharma, counsel for husband.
Referring to various judgments of Supreme Court, the high court said, "The parties in the entire marriage life of more than 18 years have lived separately for more than 15 years. Even this long period of separation has not resulted in any re-thinking or remorseness on the part of either of the parties and their bitterness towards each other continued."
Refusing to interfere with the finding of cruelty against wife by the family court, Justice Dalip Singh in the judgment held: "The cruelty alleged may largely depend upon the type of life the parties are accustomed to or their economic and social conditions. It may also depend upon their culture and human values. We, the judges and lawyers, therefore, should not import our own notions of life. There may be a generation gap between us and the parties."
"Upholding the decree of divorce, the bench observed: "The essence of marriage is sharing of a common life, a sharing of all the happiness which life has to offer and all the misery that has to be faced in life. Since this is missing in the present case, it is a fit case for divorce. It is also a case of irretrievable breakdown of marriage which only aggravate the cruelty being faced by the spouse."
