Chhattisgarh High Court has rejected a petition by the husband seeking divorce, stating that minor disagreements or little quarrels between the husband and wife cannot be considered as cruelty within the confines of a marital relationship.
The court said that when two people are incompatible or don’t behave in the same way in a marriage, that does not always mean that the marriage must be dissolved. The wife “had repeatedly told it that she was ready to return to marriage,” but the husband was not showing interest, it said.
The case was of a couple hailing from Raipur who got married in December 2014 after being in a love relationship and their families allowed it. Afterwards, they had two additional children. After arguing with her husband, the wife left the property with the kids and went to live at her parents’ house; the husband then filed an application for divorce, alleging mental cruelty.
The husband said that the wife didn’t live in his household, didn’t let the sisters touch their son, treated relatives badly and threatened self-destruction. But further down the path in the Family Court, these claims were not proven, and their petition for divorce was denied.
The husband challenged this and went to the High Court.
The decision of the Chhattisgarh High Court agreed with the Family Court’s finding that a reluctance of the wife in allowing her family to deal with her child was indicative of her protection of the child rather than cruelty towards her husband’s family.
The court also cited the wife’s affidavit where she acknowledged that she had tried to cause self-harm during an argument, she was sorry and she had given the court her assurance that an event of that kind should not happen again. It found that there was no evidence of deliberate cruelty on the husband and dismissed his appeal.