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X vs. Y

Not available · 2024 INSC 476Decided 8 Jul 2024
Not available
Justice Abhay S. Oka · Justice Ujjal Bhuyan

Background

The couple married in 1999 and had two children, now adults, but became estranged in 2006. The husband first obtained a decree for restitution of conjugal rights in 2013 (upheld by the High Court in 2015) after courts found the wife had left his company without reasonable cause, but she never returned to the marriage. He then sought and was granted a divorce decree in 2016 on grounds of cruelty and desertion, which the Punjab and Haryana High Court set aside in 2019, holding that his own conduct had left the wife no choice but to leave. Mediation before the Supreme Court also failed to reconcile the parties, who have now been separated for over 16 years.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that the concurrent, unchallenged findings in the earlier restitution-of-conjugal-rights proceedings, that the wife had deserted the husband without reasonable cause from 2008 onward, could not be reopened or ignored by the High Court while examining the later divorce case, since she never demonstrated any effort to resume cohabitation even after that decree was confirmed. It found the essential ingredients of "desertion" under Section 13(1)(ib) fully established for a continuous period well beyond the required two years, and restored the divorce decree on that specific ground (leaving intact the High Court's separate finding rejecting the "cruelty" ground). Given the husband's offer, the Court directed that the divorce would take legal effect only once he pays the wife Rs. 30 lakh as full and final lump-sum alimony/maintenance.

Lesson Learnt

A final, unappealed finding by a court in an earlier restitution-of-conjugal-rights case that one spouse deserted the other without reasonable cause carries forward and can anchor a later divorce petition on the ground of desertion: a spouse cannot ignore such a decree indefinitely without consequence.

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

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