Defaming husband without substantiation amount to cruelty: Bombay HC

The Bombay High Court has said defaming husband and calling him a womaniser and alcoholic without substantiating the allegations amount to cruelty and upheld a family court order dissolving the marriage of a Punebased coupleA division bench of Justices Nitin Jamdar and Sharmila Deshmukh in its order passed on October 12 dismissed an appeal filed by a 50yearold woman challenging a November 2005 decree passed by a family court in Pune dissolving her marriage to a retired Army officialThe man died pending hearing of the HC appeal following which the court directed for his legal heir to be added as a respondentThe woman in her appeal claimed her husband was a womaniser and alcoholic and due to these vices she was deprived of her conjugal rightsThe bench said the wifes conduct in making unwarranted and false allegations against her husbands character results in damage to his reputation in society and this amounts to crueltyThe HC in its order noted that apart from her own statement the woman has not produced any evidence to substantiate her allegationsThe deceased mans lawyer told the court that the petitioner woman had caused mental agony to her husband by making false and defamatory allegations against himAlso Read Mumbai Two men get 6month imprisonment for manhandling traffic copThe court referred to the husbands deposition before the family court wherein he had claimed that the petitioner separated him from his children and grandchildrenIt is a settled position in law that cruelty can broadly be defined as a conduct that inflicts upon the other party such mental pain and suffering as would make it not possible for that party to live with the other the high court saidThe bench further noted that the petitioners husband was an exArmy man who retired as a Major belonged to the upper strata of society and had a standing in societyThe conduct of the petitioner in making unwarranted false and baseless allegations pertaining to the respondents character and labelling him as an alcoholic and womaniser has resulted in shredding his reputation in the society the HC saidConsidering the above we find that the conduct of the petitioner constitutes cruelty within the meaning of Section 13 1 ia of the Hindu Marriage Act the court said adding it was a fit case for grant of divorceThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever