LegalAware
LegalAware.ai
EMPOWERING LEGAL AWARENESS

Rohith Thammana Gowda vs. State of Karnataka & Ors.

Civil Appeal · 2022 INSC 770Decided 29 Jul 2022
Civil Appeal No. 4987 of 2022
A.M. Khanwilkar · C.T. Ravikumar

Background

The appellant father and his wife (respondent no.3), both India-origin US Green Card holders married in Bengaluru, lived in the USA where their son was born in 2011 and became a naturalised US citizen. In March 2020 the mother brought the child to Bengaluru without the father's consent while the father was in India visiting his ailing mother; when he returned to the US he found the child missing and eventually filed a habeas corpus petition in the Karnataka High Court. Meanwhile he also obtained custody-related orders from a US court directing the child's return, though the mother contested US jurisdiction and got an earlier order vacated. The Karnataka High Court rejected the father's habeas corpus plea, keeping the child with the mother in Bengaluru (subject to visitation rights) after finding the child comfortable there.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that while a child's own wishes can be ascertained through interaction, the "best interest of the child" is a distinct legal question the court itself must determine on the totality of circumstances, and the High Court had wrongly conflated the two. It faulted the High Court for disbelieving the father's US court proceedings as merely tactical, when in fact the US court had ordered the child's return and even initiated contempt action against the mother for non-compliance. Given that the child was born and raised in the US for nearly a decade, held US citizenship and an American passport, and had better long-term prospects there, the Court held his return to the USA was in his true best interest despite his recently expressed comfort in Bengaluru schooling. It allowed the appeal, set aside the High Court's judgment, and directed the mother (or father, whoever held the child's passport) to ensure the child's return to the USA within two months, while permitting the mother to accompany him and relocate to the USA if she wished, with the father assisting her accommodation there.

Lesson Learnt

In cross-border child custody disputes, Indian courts give real weight to foreign court orders and the child's nationality, upbringing and long-term prospects, not just where the child currently feels settled or comfortable: a child's recent contentment in a new environment (often engineered by the parent who relocated the child) is not by itself proof of the child's best interest.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

More rulings in Family Law

Family LawDelhi High Court

Punam vs. Divisional Commissioner, GNCT of Delhi & Ors.

The Court upheld the validity of the Delhi Senior Citizens Rules' eviction provision, relying on recent Supreme Court rulings that such tribunals may order eviction where necessary to protect a senior citizen, and held the rule validly covers daughters-in-law as well as sons and daughters. It further held that eviction proceedings under the Senior Citizens Rules are legally independent of Domestic Violence Act maintenance proceedings, one does not need to await the other, and that the senior citizen's right to a peaceful life in her own property outweighed the daughter-in-law's claim, especially since the daughter-in-law had her own separate residence and income. The writ petition was dismissed.

Decided 30 Sept 2026Read case
Family LawDelhi High Court

Nav Ratan Sharma vs. Chetna And Anr & Anr.

The High Court held its revisional powers are narrow and don't permit re-weighing evidence absent a clear legal or jurisdictional error, finding none here. The Family Court was entitled to draw an adverse inference given the husband's contradictory statements, concealed bank account, and lack of documentary proof for his claimed salary. The Court also noted that even accepting his figure, the resulting difference in maintenance would be only about Rs. 2,500 total per month: too minor to justify interference. The revision petition was dismissed.

Decided 28 Sept 2026Read case
Family LawSupreme Court of India

Shikha v. State of Odisha

The parties ultimately reached an amicable settlement, with the husband paying the agreed permanent alimony in full. Applying its powers under Article 142 of the Constitution and following its own precedents on irretrievable breakdown of marriage (Shilpa Sailesh and Rinku Baheti), the Court granted a decree of divorce by mutual consent, dissolving the marriage solemnised on 04-12-2016. It also quashed all pending civil and criminal cases between the parties and directed that neither side file any fresh cases against the other, disposing of both transfer petitions.

Decided 28 Sept 2026Read case
Family LawSupreme Court of India

'R' v. 'E' & Anr.

The CBI's detailed report, based on witness examinations, CCTV footage analysis, and psychiatric/psychological evaluation of the child, concluded that the allegations were not reliable, were contradicted by other evidence, and appeared linked to the ongoing custody dispute rather than genuine abuse. The Supreme Court accepted this report, quashed the FIR as an abuse of process, and also quashed a related, older FIR against the mother. It confirmed that custody of the child should remain with the father, applying the "best interest of the child" principle. Recognising a broader pattern of the POCSO Act being misused as a tactic in matrimonial/custody disputes, the Court laid down specific safeguards to be followed whenever a POCSO allegation is made by one parent against another parent (or a family member) during a pending matrimonial dispute, including caution before arrest, and closer judicial scrutiny of such complaints, and directed that these safeguards be circulated to all criminal courts and police stations in the country.

Decided 24 Sept 2026Read case
Family LawSupreme Court of India

Debarati Bhunia Chakraborty v. Suman Sankar Bhunia

This is an interim order, not a final judgment. After speaking with the children in chambers, the Court made its earlier stay of the High Court's custody order absolute and allowed the mother to relocate the children to the United Kingdom for schooling for the present. She must produce the children before any court when directed. The appeals will be heard in January 2027.

Decided 23 Sept 2026Read case
Family LawSupreme Court of India

Mihir Prakash Bajoria v. Vidushi Jain Bajoria

The Supreme Court upheld the High Court's reasoning, restating that anti-suit injunctions are an extraordinary remedy to be granted sparingly. The party seeking one must show the foreign proceedings are oppressive/vexatious or in a forum non conveniens, and that refusal would defeat the ends of justice, per the settled principles in Modi Entertainment Network v. WSG Cricket. Applying these principles, the Court found the UK Family Court was in fact the more convenient forum, since both parties had genuinely established their matrimonial home, residence, and financial life in London for years, giving the UK court substantial connecting factors to the dispute. The husband's argument that a prospective foreign divorce decree on the ground of irretrievable breakdown would be unenforceable in India under Section 13 CPC was held to be speculative and premature, since the UK proceedings had not yet concluded and the foreign court's own jurisdiction was itself still under adjudication, relying on its own precedent in Dinesh Singh Thakur v. Sonal Thakur, which similarly declined to grant anti-suit relief merely because a foreign court might apply a ground for divorce not recognised in India. The Court noted that although the UK court had since passed a conditional divorce decree during the appeal's pendency (which the Supreme Court had separately stayed), that development was outside the scope of this appeal, which was confined only to examining the validity of the original 2025 anti-suit injunction. Finding the High Court's vacation of that injunction legally correct, the Supreme Court dismissed the husband's appeal, while leaving both parties free to raise any grounds regarding the later UK divorce order before the appropriate forum.

Decided 22 Sept 2026Read case