Wife’s refusal to have physical relations, the whole matter reached the High Court

New Delhi: Irritability, minor friction and lack of trust between married couples cannot be confused with mental cruelty, the Delhi High Court said while hearing a divorce case. The High Court made this comment on Monday while refusing to uphold the lower court’s order granting divorce on the husband’s petition against the wife.

The husband sought divorce on the ground of mental cruelty by the wife alleging that she was not interested in living with him in her in-laws house and she wanted the husband to live with her in her maternal home as ‘Ghar Jamai’. The two were married in 1996 as per Hindu rituals and the couple had a daughter in 1998.

The husband had claimed that his wife used to leave him alone on one pretext or the other and was only interested in running her coaching centre. He had alleged that even his wife forbade him from having sex.

A bench of Justices Sanjeev Sachdeva and Manoj Jain, hearing the wife’s appeal, said that although refusing to have sex can be considered a form of mental cruelty, only when it is persistent, deliberate and over a considerable period of time. The bench said, however, that the court needs to exercise utmost caution in dealing with such a sensitive and delicate issue.

The High Court said that such allegations cannot be proved on the basis of mere vague statements, especially when the marriage was duly solemnized. The bench observed that the husband has failed to prove any mental cruelty inflicted on him and the present case is “only a case of ordinary discord in the marital bond.”

The bench said, “There is no positive indication that the conduct of the wife was such that it was not possible for her husband to live with her. Minor irritability and lack of trust cannot be confused with mental cruelty.”

The court also said that the mere fact that the woman had approached the police with a criminal complaint, resulting in an FIR being lodged against her husband, who was ultimately given the benefit of doubt in the case, would not amount to cruelty. Thus, the picture that emerges is very clear, the court said. There was a lack of trust, faith and love between the parties, but despite this, both of them were working hard to save the family. Merely because the wife had approached the court for redressal of her grievance, as her husband had also done, cannot amount to abetment of cruelty.