Larger bench for mutual divorces
A larger bench of the Supreme Court will decide an important question of counting the six months time for the trial courts to set in motion the process for mutually agreed divorce between husband and wife under the Hindu Marriage Act.
The dispute about counting of the six-month time frame under sub-section (2) of section 13-B, which deals with the mutually agreed divorce under the Hindu Marriage Act arose due to conflicting verdicts given by various high courts.
A bench of Justices D.K. Jain and C.K. Prasad has referred the issue to the Chief Justice of India to enable him to place it before a larger bench for decision, pointing out that the language of sub-section (2) framed by Parliament was though “unambiguous” but it needed to be defined whether the process could be initiated before the expiry of the six months time frame.
The section provides that “the procedural step that are required to be taken once the petition for divorce by mutual consent has been filed and six months have expired from the date of presentation of the petition before the court.” A divorce petition of Delhi-based couple — Neeti Malviya and Rakesh Malviya — threw the question of law, as they wanted early resolution of their marriage mutually. The question arose whether court can decide the case even before the expiry of the “statutory period” of six months when the husband and wife had agreed to dissolve the marriage with mutual consent, or should it wait and sit over the file till the six-month deadline is over. In the opinion of the bench, it would unnecessary linger on the process in cases where there was no possibility of resolution of the dispute between warring husband and wife and it would lead to piling up of the cases.
The larger bench would decide whether under sub-section (2) of the Hindu Marriage Act the period of six-months for presenting the case before the trial court could be “waived off” or reduced by the Supreme Court.
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