“No Point Keeping A Marriage Alive With Legal Ties After Irretrievable Breakdown,” Says Kerala High Court
It’s heartbreaking to see a marriage end but what’s worse is when you have to continue being in a broken relationship. One feels trapped because some paperwork says that your relationship with this other person has not ended. Marriage in India is considered sacred but when one has to get out of a marriage, the judiciary gets involved and while divorce with mutual consent is not a very lengthy process, if it’s an ugly divorce, it’s usually years before the marriage is dissolved by divorce. In most cases, divorce cases continue for a minimum of 7 to 8 years which means that both parties spend this time feeling trapped and suffocated in a marriage that only exists on paper. But in a recent case Kerala High Court observed that when a marriage is broken beyond repair, the law should take notice of it because refusing to sever the legal ties of such marriages is injurious to the interest of both the man and woman as well as the society.
A division bench of Kerala High Court comprising Justices Anil K Narendran and CS Sudha were hearing a matrimonial appeal filed by the husband to challenge the decree of dissolution of marriage granted by the Lower Court due to the grounds of non-consummation of marriage. The man claimed that it was an incorrect appreciation of evidence, facts and law which has concluded that the marriage has not been consummated and granted divorce to the wife. As per Live Law, the husband’s counsel submitted that no sufficient pleadings were made to establish non-consummation of marriage among other things. In this case, the couple had tied the knot the January 2009 and the petition for the dissolution was filed 10 months after it which means that 14 years have passed since then.
Dismissing the matrimonial appeal, the Kerala High Court noted that when there has been a long period of continuous separation it can be said that the matrimonial bond is beyond repaid and the marriage becomes fiction supported by a legal tie. The court observed that by refusing to sever that legal tie, the law does not serve the sanctity of marriage but instead shows a disregard for the feelings and emotions of the parties involved. The Court said that while the public interest demands that married status be maintained for as long as possible when a marriage has been “wrecked beyond the hope of salvage” the same must be recognised.
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Noting that there is no way to compel someone to resume married life with their spouse, the Court said that nothing can be gained by keeping a man and woman tied to a marriage which has ceased to exist and life is too short to allow situations caused by misery to continue indefinitely and the law cannot turn a blind eye to it. The Kerala High Court noted that the marriage between the couple in question was only in name and to continue to keep the sham is “conducive to immorality” and prejudicial to the public interest. The Court dismissed the husband’s appeal and held that the wife has successfully established grounds for cruelty.
