Claims of parents subservient to interest of child: Delhi High Court stays order granting father daily visitation rights

Claims of the parents must be treated as subservient to the interest of the child, the Delhi High Court recently observed while staying an order granting visitation rights to an estranged father of a 2-year-old child [Kinri Dhir v. Veer Singh]..The observation came from Justice Yashwant Varma, who noted that the family court had failed to consider the harmful impact that the order granting visitation rights to the father would have."The order ultimately passed requires the minor child of 2½ years to be moved out of the residence and be taken by the respondent for a period of 2 hours on a daily basis. The Principal Judge has clearly failed to weigh or consider the disruptive and deleterious impact that this may have. Matter requires consideration," the order stated..The petitioner wife had moved the High Court to set aside an order passed by Principal Judge Madhu Jain of the Family Court at South-East District, Saket. The lower court had partially allowed an application filed under Section 12 of the Guardian and Wards Act by the respondent father, allowing him daily visitation rights from 6 to 8 PM..At the outset, the Court noted that the proceedings before the family court were not based on any allegation of the mother failing to discharge her obligations or adequately caring for the welfare of the minor child. The order stated,"Prima facie and as this Court goes through the order passed by the Principal Judge, it is apparent that the court proceeded on the incorrect path of seeking to consider and evaluate the competing rights of parents to be accorded custody and/or granted rights of visitation. The above claims which are raised by competing parents must necessarily be recognized as being subservient to the interest of the child which has always and consistently been recognized as being paramount.".The Court listed the matter for further hearing on January 7, 2022, till which time the stay on the family court order will continue..Senior Advocate Geeta Luthra and Advocates Shivani Luthra Lohiya, Nitin Saluja, Asmita Narula, Anubhav Singh and Priyanka Prasanth appeared for the petitioner.Senior Advocate Sandeep Sethi, along with Advocates Saurav Upadhyay, Gargi Tuli, Anuj Dhir and Hardikaa represented the respondent..The petitioner claimed that the order was passed after the lower court was misled by the respondent on two aspects - that he has admitted to the paternity of the minor, and is residing in the same premises as the petitioner, albeit on a different floor."Petitioner is the mother and natural guardian of an infant, minor baby boy, who has barely been weaned off from the mother less than a year ago. The minor 2 year old baby child’s schedule and routine and that of the mother cannot be subjected to such a strict, onerous and unreasonable regime which is contrary to the law of the land," the petitioner stated in her plea..The plea stated that the order has thrown the welfare of the child to the winds by permitting unsupervised access to the respondent, who admittedly calls himself only the putative father of the child. The petition further stated,"The trial court has completely ignored the vehement submissions of the petitioner made in the guardianship petition reply and all her pleadings which pertain to the welfare and interest of her child and which demonstrate the erratic, unreasonable, obsessive and controlling nature and the morality of the Respondent, who is denying his marriage to her after inducing her to cohabit with him on this pretext and is obstructing/monitoring her..."Moreover, the respondent is now refusing to return the minor child at 8 PM, in blatant contravention of the family court order, the plea stated. It was alleged that the respondent is guilty of contemptuous conduct as he was returning the minor child as per his whims and fancies, and well beyond the stipulated return time..It was claimed that the respondent was disturbing the custody of the 2-year-old child with the mother on a daily basis, which was adversely affecting the minor, as his stability, security and routine are being hampered. Another claim made by the petitioner was that the respondent belongs to a very influential family and has used his resources to stalk, spy on, record and follow the petitioner directly and through his employees. Further, he allegedly physically restrained her from leaving the rented residence with their child. At one point, he had installed CCTV cameras which were only removed after the oral directions of the Court, the plea stated.The petitioner thus sought a stay on the family court's order granting the respondent-father daily visitation rights..[Read order]