‘Nothing more harrowing for husband than to see wife act as widow’

New Delhi: No experience can be more harrowing for a husband than to see his wife act as a widow while he is alive, and such a conduct amounts to “extreme cruelty”, the Delhi High Court has said.

It said a marriage cannot survive if a spouse deprives the other of conjugal relationship and doing so is also an

act of cruelty.

“Nothing can be a more harrowing experience for a husband than to see his wife act as a widow during his lifetime, that too in a situation where he was seriously injured and expected nothing more than care and compassion from his significant other. Undeniably, such conduct of the appellant/ wife can only be termed as an act of extreme cruelty towards the respondent/ husband,” a bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Neena Bansal Krishna said.

The high court’s judgment came while dismissing a woman’s appeal challenging a family court’s decision granting a divorce decree in her husband’s favour, holding that she acted with cruelty towards him.

“We thus, conclude that the evidence on record proved that there is no chance of reconciliation between the parties and such long separation peppered which false allegations, police reports and criminal trial can only be termed as

mental cruelty.

“The marital discord between the parties has pinnacled to complete loss of faith, trust, understanding, love and affection between the parties. This dead relationship has become infested with acrimony, irreconcilable differences and protracted litigations; any insistence to continue this relationship would only be perpetuating further cruelty upon both the parties,” the bench said.