In a ruling in Dipanwita Das v. Moloy Das, the Calcutta High Court ruled on Friday that it is the joint responsibility of the husband and wife to foster a friendly environment that will allow them to live in harmony and that it is inappropriate to place the husband above the wife.
A family court’s finding that the wife creates the “climate” and the husband creates the “landscape” in a happy marriage was met with disapproval by a division bench of Justices Harish Tandon and Madhuresh Prasad.
This observation is an outdated idea that has steadily faded away as civilization has advanced in all spheres. The bench stated in its order that “the two people who were born and raised in different environments have a reciprocal and/or collective duty to create a congenial atmosphere which cannot be said to be a one way traffic.”
The bench went on to state that it was the responsibility of both the husband and the wife to work through the minor disagreements that arise in a married relationship.
“Even the Constitution of India recognises equality in gender and therefore, the husband to be put on higher degree than that of the wife is unacceptable,” the court stated.
The High Court stated that the family court seemed to be influenced by feelings and an improper interpretation of the facts.
As a result, we were unable to convince ourselves to concur with the conclusions reached in the contested judgment, which is subsequently overturned. The wife’s plea for the restoration of conjugal rights was granted, but the husband’s claim for a solution of marriage was denied,” the judge ruled.
According to the case’s facts, the husband claimed that his wife had abused him, battered him and his mother, and made up accusations against him and his family in order to subject him to cruelty.
However, the wife disagreed with the husband’s assertions, claiming that she was the victim of mental abuse at the hands of the husband and his family.
In its ruling, the court talked about how the family court valued the evidence that was submitted. It stated that the wife’s plea for restitution of conjugal rights was made later, after she had first, like her husband, filed a plea for the dissolution of the marriage, which was the only reason the family court found against her.
The High Court ruled that it was wrong to make such judgments based just on the fact that the wife had not initially filed for the restoration of her marital rights.
Additionally, it was discovered that the family court’s conclusions—which claimed that the wife had cruelly treated her husband and in-laws by bringing a case against them—were unfounded because the wife had only complained about her husband’s departure from the marital residence.
The bench pointed out that the complaint in question contained no arrests and that, in accordance with the Hindu Marriage Act, this would not constitute cruelty.
The wife was represented by advocates Sabyasachi Chatterjee, Dyutiman Banerjee, Sandipan Das, Subhrajit Saha, Anindita Chatterjee, Badrul Karim, Kiron Sk, Sanajit Roy, and Saumava Ganguly.
The spouse was represented by attorney Swagata Dutta.
Wife and husband have a duty to foster a friendly home environment: Calcutta High Court
