Cracking the whip on the quick marriage and quicker divorce culture, the Supreme Court (SC) has said that a couple separated within two days of tying the knot doesn’t have any fundamental right to divorce unless they stay away from each other for six months.
The separation period is mandatory under the Hindu Marriage Act.
In a rare case, a newly wedded couple in a hurry to get divorce, had invoked Article 32 of the Constitution. Under the provision, the apex court can be moved to direct the state or its functionaries to enforce the fundamental rights (FR) or restore it.
A woman, Poonam, had filed a writ petition in SC, challenging a family court order that had refused her an immediate divorce. Invoking Article 32 of the Constitution, Poonam had said in her plea that the family court order violated her FR. She had made her husband, Sumit, a respondent in the case.
Rejecting her plea, the SC said merely signing the consent for divorce without raising fingers at each other wouldn’t be acceptable to law.
Poonam and her husband Sumit will have to fulfill the six month test and approach the family court again for divorce, the SC said.
Poonam’s lawyers could not enlighten the apex court as to how the family court’s order violated their FR. The SC also couldn’t fathom how the family court could have directed the husband, an individual, to restore her FR.
Initially, Poonam’s lawyer, who is registered with the apex court, didn’t appear. At last, one lawyer appeared in the case and expressed ignorance as to how such a writ petition was filed.
An anguished bench of justices Aftab Alam and BS Chauhan on Tuesday termed the conduct of the lawyers and the couple ‘reprehensible’ and dismissed the petition.
“The petition has been filed without any sense of responsibility by the parties or their counsel. This is tantamount to not only disservice to the institution but it also adversely affects the administration of justice,” said the bench, adding “conduct of all of them has been reprehensible”.
