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New Delhi, Feb. 22:
The Supreme Court today directed that all criminal courts must try to
adopt mediation efforts to settle matrimonial disputes, particularly
cases of Section 498A under the IPC that covers harassment of a woman by
her husband and his family members.
The apex court
passed a series of directives while granting Srinvas Rao divorce from
Deepa after holding the wife guilty of falsely accusing her
mother-in-law of asking her to sleep with the father-in-law and slapping
criminal cases against the family.
Section 498A is a
cognisable offence with a punishment of up to three years in jail and a
fine and is non-compoundable, which rules out an out-of-court
settlement.
But the apex court today said courts can try to strike a compromise between a couple.
In this case,
Deepa was married to Srinivas on April 25, 1999, but on the very next
day, the couple separated after a quarrel between the elders in the two
families. Subsequently, Deepa lodged a complaint under 498A against the
husband and in-laws, alleging that the mother-in-law had asked her to
sleep with the father-in-law.
Srinivas filed a
suit for divorce that was granted by the trial court on the ground that
the allegations were baseless and hence he was entitled to divorce “for
cruelty”. The husband and the family members were also acquitted of the
charge of harassment.
The wife appealed
in the high court against the grant of divorce and sought restitution of
conjugal rights. She also challenged the acquittal in the criminal
case.
Andhra Pradesh
High Court on November 8, 2006, set aside the divorce decree, following
which the husband appealed in the Supreme Court.
Upholding the
appeal, a bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Prakash Desai said:
“In our opinion, the first instance of mental cruelty is seen in the
scurrilous, vulgar and defamatory statement made by the respondent-wife
in her complaint dated 4/10/1999 addressed to the Superintendent of
Police, Women Protection Cell.…
“It is his case
that this humiliation of his parents caused great anguish to him. He and
his family were traumatised by the false and indecent statement made in
the complaint. His grievance appears to us to be justified,” Justice
Ranjana, writing the judgment, said.
The apex court
noted the statement made by the wife and her mother in which they
admitted to having falsely implicated the husband’s family but now
wanted to withdraw the case as Deepa wanted to live with Srinivas and
his family.
“A marriage which
is dead for all purposes cannot be revived by the court’s verdict, if
the parties are not willing. This is because marriage involves human
sentiments and emotions and if they are dried up there is hardly any
chance of their springing back to life on account of artificial reunion
created by the court’s decree,” the bench said, granting the divorce.
The apex court,
however, said many marriages are breaking down because of ego clashes.
Hence, it passed the following directions:
(a) In terms of
Section 9 of the Family Courts Act, the family courts shall make all
efforts to settle matrimonial disputes through mediation. Even if the
counsellors submit a failure report, the family courts shall, with the
consent of the parties, refer the matter to the mediation centre.
In such a case,
however, the family courts shall set a reasonable time limit for
mediation centres to complete the process of mediation…. In a given
case, if there is good chance of settlement, the family court in its
discretion, can always extend the time limit.
(b) The criminal
courts dealing with the complaint under Section 498A of the IPC should…
refer the parties to a mediation centre if they feel that there exist
elements of settlement and both the parties are willing. However, they
should take care to see that in this exercise, rigour, purport and
efficacy of Section 498-A of the IPC is not diluted….
(c) All mediation
centres shall set up pre-litigation desks/clinics; give them wide
publicity and make efforts to settle matrimonial disputes at
pre-litigation stage.
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