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Wife Cannot Call Husband Alcoholic, Womaniser Without Proof: Bombay HC

The woman stated in her appeal that she had been denied her conjugal rights because her husband was a womaniser and an alcoholic. However, the bench did observe that, aside from her own statement, the woman had not provided any documentary evidence for her claims.

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Priya Prakash
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The Bombay High Court has said that labelling one's spouse a womaniser or an alcoholic without providing evidence constitutes cruelty. Recently, a 50-year-old woman's appeal was dismissed against a November 2005 family court ruling in Pune.  The case was heard by the division bench of Justices Nitin Jamdar and Sharmila Deshmukh.
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The woman stated in her appeal that she had been denied conjugal rights because her spouse was a womaniser and an alcoholic. However, the bench observe that, aside from her own statement, the woman could not provide evidence for her claims. Even her own sister had not made any claims about the retired Major being a womaniser or an alcoholic. While the case was pending in the High Court, the spouse, who had retired from the Army as a Major, passed away. As a result, the high court ordered that his legal heir be added as a party to the petition.

In a previous application, the retired Major requested a divorce from the woman, as he did not wanted to stay with her over the mental agony inflicted by the woman.  The woman had filed a high court petition challenging that 2005 order.

Wife Cannot Call Husband Alcoholic, Womaniser Without Proof: Bombay HC

The bench said, "We are mindful of the fact that the wife is entitled to take all defences necessary to oppose the husband’s application, including the defence that it is the husband, who is guilty of causing cruelty and cannot take advantage of his own wrong, the caveat being that the wife is able to substantiate the allegations, lest it constitute an act of cruelty. In the present case, the wife has failed to prove the allegations, and looking at the gravity of the allegations, it is a fit case for a grant of divorce."


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The spouse claimed that the woman had cut off his contact with his children and grandchildren, and when he sought solace in social work, she went to the staff members of the institution where he was employed and made the same accusations, defaming him in the process. As a result of this behaviour, the husband's family life as well as his social life had been totally destroyed.

According to the court, "cruelty" is generally defined in the law as conduct that causes the other party such emotional agony and suffering that it would be impossible for that party to coexist with the other. The husband's reputation in society has been damaged as a result of the wife's actions, the bench said, in which she made baseless, misleading, and unsubstantiated accusations about his character and called him an alcoholic and womaniser.

Bombay High Court
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