Ill-treatment of stepchildren amounts to mental cruelty against husband: Kerala High Court allows divorce

Cruelty by a wife towards her stepchildren amounts to cruelty against her husband entitling him to divorce, the Kerala High Court recently ruled while granting divorce to a man on those grounds [XXXX v YYYY and connected case]

Justice Sathish Ninan and Justice P Krishna Kumar made the observation while upholding a decree of divorce granted by the family court to the husband locked in a long-standing marital dispute with his second wife whom he married after his first wife passed away.

The Bench emphasised that cruelty towards the stepchildren amounted to mental cruelty towards the husband under Section 10(1)(x) of the Indian Divorce Act, 1869.

The provision lays down that cruelty include acts that could cause a reasonable doubt in the mind of a spouse that continuing to live together with the other would be harmful or injurious.

The Court clarified that such cruelty would include both physical and mental acts and courts while dealing with matrimonial disputes, must interpret the term 'cruelty' uniformly under personal laws, irrespective of the religion of the parties.

"One of the seminal principles of interpretation is that statutory provisions should be construed in conformity with the constitutional scheme and the mandate of equality. Therefore, we do not find any justification in the attempt made by the respondent to attack the impugned judgment on the above ground. Even otherwise, if the wife is guilty of ill-treating the children, certainly it would cause reasonable apprehension in the mind of the husband that it would be harmful or injurious for him to live with her. The expression “harmful or injurious” is not confined to physical acts alone, but equally extends to mental torture," the Court added.

In this case, the husband who worked as a technician in a US military base in Afghanistan, married his second wife under Christian personal law to ensure that his two minor children from his first marriage could be taken care of.

However, he alleged that soon after their marriage, his wife refused to take care of his children and ailing father and began to behave cruelly with them and even attempted suicide by consuming some tablets.

The wife denied the allegations stating that she was a loving wife and was only trying to correct the children's behaviour when they acted inappropriately.

She added that it was in fact her husband and the son who were torturing her physically and mentally.

The husband filed for a divorce and a family court allowed his petition on the ground of cruelty and ordered ₹6,000 per month as maintenance to the wife.

The wife challenged the decreee of divorce before the High Court through an appeal. Both spouses had also filed revision petitions.

The Court after examining the evidence and testimonies found that the wife's conduct, particularly her ill-treatment of her stepchildren, could reasonably be seen as causing mental agony to the husband.

It also noted that the wife's attempt to commit suicide by consuming pills without any reasonable cause and her repeated threats of committing suicide added to the mental agony of the husband and constituted matrimonial cruelty under the statute, justifying the family court's grant of divorce.

"There is evidence on record that after the said incident she was hospitalized and her stomach was washed. The above aspects probabilise the contention of the petitioner that she attempted to commit suicide without any reasonable cause. It is settled law that making such suicide attempts or threats would amount to cruelty on the spouse," the Court added.

Thus, the Court dismissed the wife's challenge and upheld the divorce but enhanced the monthly maintenance from ₹6,000 to ₹15,000 after taking into account the husband's financial capacity and the fact that the original sum was insufficient to meet the wife's needs.

The wife was represented by advocates DG Vipin and Karol Mathews Sebastian Alencherry.

The husband was represented by advocates Abraham George Jacob, Jibu P Thomas and C Muralikrishnan.

[Read Judgment]