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Divorce Proceedings Not Attended
It is not uncommon to hear about cases either the husband or the wife filed for
divorce in a foreign court, while the spouse did not attend the proceedings either due
to notice not being served or due to some other reason. In such a situation, the case
of Y Narasimha Rao3
is relevant.
Y. Narsimha Rao and Y. Venkata Lakshmi were married in Tirupati, India as per
Hindu customs in 1975. They separated in July 1978. Mr. Rao filed a petition for
dissolution of marriage in the Circuit Court of St. Louis County Missouri, USA. Mrs.
Lakshmi sent her reply from India under protest. The Circuit Court passed a decree
for dissolution of marriage on February 19, 1980 in the absence of Mrs. Lakshmi. Mr.
Rao had earlier filed a petition for dissolution of marriage in the sub-Court of Tirupati.
Later, he filed an application for dismissing the petition in view of the decree passed
by the Missouri Court.
On 2 November 1981, Mr. Rao married another woman. Hence, Mrs. Lakshmi filed a
criminal complaint against Mr. Rao for the offence of bigamy. The Supreme Court
refused to accept the divorce decree granted by the court at Missouri, USA. While
deciding the case the Supreme Court laid down the law for foreign matrimonial
judgments in this country. The relevant extract from the judgment is as follows:
The jurisdiction assumed by the foreign court as well as the ground on which the
relief is granted must be in accordance with the matrimonial law under which the
parties are married. The exceptions to this rule may be as follows: (i) where the
matrimonial action is filed in the forum where the respondent is domiciled habitually
and permanently resides and the relief is granted on a ground available in the
matrimonial law under which the parties are married; (ii) where the respondentvoluntarily and effectively submits to the jurisdiction of the forum as discussed above
and contests the claim which is based on a ground available under the matrimonial
law under which the parties are married; (iii) where the respondent consents to the
grant of the relief although the jurisdiction of the forum is not in accordance with the
provisions of the matrimonial law of the parties.
The key rule laid by the Supreme Court can be summed up as follows: If a couple is
married under Hindu law, (a) the foreign court that grants divorce must be acceptable
under Hindu law; and (b) the foreign court should grant divorce only on the grounds
which are permissible under Hindu Law. The two conditions make it almost
impossible for a Hindu couple married in India to get a legally valid divorce
from a foreign court since no foreign court is an acceptable one under Hindu
Marriage Act and also because no foreign court is likely to consider the
provisions of Hindu Marriage Act before granting divorce.
The exceptions that Supreme Court has permitted to the above rule laid by it are as
follows in a case where husband has filed for divorce in a foreign land:
A) The wife must be domiciled and permanently resident of that foreign land AND
the foreign court should decide the case based on Hindu Marriage Act.
B) The wife voluntarily and effectively attends the court proceedings and
contests the claim on grounds of divorce as permitted under Hindu Marriage
Act.
C) The wife consents to grant of divorce
Exception A seems almost impossible. Exception B is examined in the next section.
Exception C means that the divorce is obtained by mutual consent and therefore the
courts of India do not want to interfere with it.
In a recent case (March 2012), Sunder and Shyamala tied the knot in Vellore district
in 1999, Sunder went to the USA within a year and did not communicate with
Shyamala after that. In 2000, she received summons from Superior Court of
California, which subsequently granted divorce despite the wife’s defence statement.
Madras High Court held that the Superior Court of California was not a court of
competent jurisdiction to decide the matrimonial dispute in this case