Matrimonial disputes: India
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S. 498(A) IPC
False complaints
Dhananjay Mahapatra, December 09, 2014
The Supreme Court onsaid false complaints under Section 498A of Indian Penal Code against innocent in-laws alleging cruelty and harassment at matrimonial homes were increasingly making the husbands adamant not to take back their wives.
“For no fault, the in-laws, especially old parents of the husband, are taken to jail the moment a false complaint is filed against them by a woman under Section 498A. By roping in in-laws without a reason and for settling a score with the husband, the false and exaggerated 498A complaints are causing havoc to marriages” said a bench of Chief Justice H L Dattu and A K Sikri.
These comments assume significance as it has been a trend with the SC to seek response from the husband on a mere mention of a petition by a woman in matrimonial disputes. The court also readily transfers a matrimonial case to a place convenient to the wife, brushing aside protests from the husband.
Dismissing a woman's petition, who had appealed against a trial court's decision not to permit her lead evidence against the two brothers of her husband, the CJI said, “There is an increasing hardening of stand among husbands, whose parents had been arrested in false 498A cases, not to take back the wife. They say they are willing to give her all the property , they will take care of the children's education and marriage but will not take her back.“
Procedures
Transfer of cases at wives’ request
The Times of India, Jan 09 2015
Why should hubbies suffer every time: SC
Turns Down Woman's Plea To Shift Case
For two decades, the Supreme Court had mostly acceded to requests of estranged wives to transfer matrimonial disputes to places of their convenience warranting the husbands to make long trips to attend court hearings.
The trend was reversed on Thursday by a bench of Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justice A K Sikri, which admitted that the court had been very lenient to the pleas of wives to put husbands to discomfiture. “Estranged wives seeking transfer of cases, filed by husbands, to their places of residence has become the order of the day . We had become too liberal in acceding to their requests. But the husbands also have a right. Why the husbands should be always made to suffer,“the bench asked and indicated that it would from now on take into account merits of the husbands' plea against such requests by wives seeking transfer of cases.
There had been a rising trend among women in matrimonial disputes to seek transfer of pending cases to places situated far away from the husbands' places of work so as to inconvenience them the most. The court had traditionally accepted the wives' pleas given the social background where the estranged wife generally rushed to her parents' home and that it would be difficult for the parents to foot the cost of travel and litigation cost at a far away place.
The court refused to transfer a matrimonial dispute from Ghaziabad to Betul at the wife's request despite her counsel informing the court that she was a permanent resident of Betul in Madhya Pradesh.
The CJI added, “They take a plea before the court that they may have committed a mistake but for that punishing their old parents on a false complaint was not condonable. The false complaints under Section 498A are ruining marriages. “The court had some advice for women who file complaints under Section 498A. “When you file complaints under Section 498A, be circumspect and truthful. You unnecessarily involve old people in your complaint, you end up ruining the marriage,“ it said.
Husband must attend court wherever wife files case: CJI
The Times of India, Sep 01 2015
Dhananjay Mahapatra
Husband must follow wherever wife files case, says CJI Dattu ust six months after giving hope to estranged husbands that J they need not always be at the receiving end, the Supreme Court said wherever a wife files a case of cruelty in the matrimonial home against her husband, he has to go there and face proceedings. Counsel for an estranged husband facing cases under Section 498A of Indian Penal Code instituted by his wife in Goa told a bench of Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justice Amitava Roy that the alleged incidents of harassment in the matrimonial home happened in UP, the woman's father was a resident of Haryana, yet she chose to file the case in Goa to harass him. When he sought transfer of the case to a mutually convenient place, the bench rejected the argument saying a husband has to travel to the place where the case was instituted by the estranged wife. The CJI said, “In Indian society, we believe that wherever the wife goes, the husband has to faithfully follow her there.“
