The Supreme Court recently quashed a domestic violence complaint filed by a woman in Jammu after an earlier attempt at mutual divorce between herself and her husband had failed..Calling the allegations vague and generalised, the bench of Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and K Vinod Chandran said that the complaint amounted to an "abuse of the process of law"..The Court was hearing a Special Leave Petition filed by the husband seeking to set aside a 2023 order of a magistrate in Jammu that had refused to quash the complaint filed by his estranged wife.The couple had married in April 2018 under Hindu rites. However, following differences, both parties jointly filed a mutual consent divorce petition before the family court on October 9, 2019. That petition was later withdrawn by the wife on January 25, 2020.Just days later, on February 6, 2020, the wife filed a domestic violence complaint under Section 12 of the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005. The husband challenged the maintainability of the complaint, pointing out that all the alleged incidents mentioned by the wife had taken place before October 2019, when the mutual divorce petition was still pending.The magistrate had rejected this objection in October 2023 and listed the matter for evidence. The husband then approached the Supreme Court..The top court noted that the wife's allegations that she was thrown out of the house and subjected to torture were not only vague, but also referred to a period before the couple had jointly agreed to separate.“The allegations which have been made such as that she has been thrown out of the house and being tortured, etc. are not only vague and generalized but they all precede the date i.e. on 09.10.2019 on which joint application for Mutual Divorce was filed,” the Court said in its order. .Taking into account the sequence of events and the contents of the complaint, the Court concluded that the proceedings were being misused.“Considering the nature of the case and the allegations made in the complaint and the sequence of events…the entire complaint seems to be nothing but an abuse of the process of law,” the order stated..With this, the Court set aside the magistrate’s 2023 order and quashed the domestic violence proceedings pending against the husband. The wife, despite being served notice, did not appear before the Supreme Court..The petitioner-husband was represented by Advocates Akshat Malpani and Vandana Gupta. The petition was filed through Advocate Rahul Gupta.
