Prabhakar Nikam has been living separately from his wife Satyabhama since he was 20. Nineteen years later, he is still legally bound to his wife.
A Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court recently rejected his plea for a divorce from his wife saying there was “no ground for divorce”.
Nikam, a resident of Mehkar taluka in Buldhana district, married Satyabhama in May 1983. Nikam said Satyabhama would often fight with him and go to her parents’ house. In 1989, she met with an accident, but after recovering she went to her parents with their son never to return.
Nikam then moved the trial court for divorce under the Hindu Marriage Act, saying his wife “treated him with cruelty and has without any reason withdrawn herself from his company”.
Satyabhama countered the allegations saying he had “ill-treated” her and that she was forced to “bring dowry from her parents”. She claimed that she attempted suicide because of harassment. Since Nikam treated her cruelly, she had a “reasonable cause to live separately” from him, she said.
The trial court said Nikam could not prove that his wife treated him cruelly or that she had deserted him. However, since the marriage was irretrievably broken, the trial court decided that Nikam was entitled for a divorce decree.
Satyabhama, however, challenged the order before the additional district judge, who set aside the trial court’s order “as no case for divorce was made out”.
In 1998, Nikam moved the high court seeking a judicial separation from his wife. (Judicial separation is an order from the court, which entitles a couple to live separately, which can later be cited as a ground for a divorce.) Nikam argued that there was sufficient ground for a judicial separation since he and his wife had not been living together for many years.
Dismissing his petition on March 28, Justice CL Pangarkar said Nikam had to first make out a ground for divorce before seeking judicial separation.
“The man seeking divorce has to prove a fault ground (sic), like say cruelty. If the desertion is ‘constructive’ - that is a situation constructed by the husband - then it is not a ground for divorce,” said advocate Veena Gowda, who practises in family courts.
