JUDGEMENT :- The appellant (original petitioner) is the husband of the 1st respondent (original respondent). She is alleged to have committed adultery with the 2nd respondent (original co-respondent). The petition was dismissed, hence, this appeal.

2. The petitioner and the 1st respondent were married on 14-2-1943 according to Hindu Vedic rites, both being Hindus. They have four issues: three sons and one daughter. The first son is 27 years old, the daughter is 25 years old and the other two sons are respectively 17 and 15 years old. The allegations in the petition, which are not only vague but confusing, are, inter alia, that since about few years prior to the petition, the respondent had been cold and indifferent towards the petitioner; that her conduct aroused suspicion of the petitioner about the fidelity of the respondent. In or about 1969 the petitioner arranged un-obstructive watch on the movements of the respondent through investigative agencies. It is alleged that the respondent was seen moving out of the house almost every day in the absence of the petitioner and meeting various persons of opposite sex and was seen visiting pictures in their company but would return home before the petitioner re­turned. In the beginning the petitioner pulled up the respondent and pointed out that the respondent should realise her re­sponsibility in life and should lead a chaste life. It is alleged that sometimes the re-respondent was seen entering a room in a hotel in the company of the co-respondent and coming out after a good length of time. In the following para it is alleged that on finding that his persuasion did not have any effect on the respondent, the petitioner sent a registered letter to the respondent through his advocate in May, 1969, recording the facts. The letter had some effect on the re­spondent, who improved in her behaviour for sometime, but after a few months, the petitioner again found the respondent to be acting in the same manner and discovered that the respondent in the company of the co-respondent was visiting pictures and hotels and would remain with the co-respon­dent in rooms in hotels for quite sometime. The petitioner had the movements of the respondent kept under watch in the month of Nov., 1971 and found that on 2-11-1971, the respondent was seen going out with two ladies. The respondent was very well dressed at that time. In the company of those ladies she went to Hotel Buckly Court at Wodehouse Road in a taxi and one of the ladies (other than the respondent) went in the hotel to enquire anxiously for some person but had to come back disappointed. From there the three ladies visited a cinema and after the show again went to the said hotel and returned back. It is then alleged that on 3-11-1971, the respondent went in a building known as Sakar Bhavan at 6th Khetwadi and enquired about some person from a lady on the 2nd floor of the said building, and finding that, that person was not at home, the respondent went to Grant Road, entered a shop known as Simplex Readymade Store and after sometime went to Shalimar Talkies at Grant Road, where co-respondent met her and they went inside the theatre at about 2.45 p.m. The respon­dent was already having tickets of the show. They came out of the theatre at about 3.15 p.m., hired a taxi bearing No. BMR 1454 and went inside Aroma Hotel near Chitra Cinema, Dadar, and came out after some enquiries. From there they proceeded by the same taxi to Preetam Hotel (which is an eating house and not a residential hotel) at Khodadad Circle, Dadar and were there till about 4.30 p.m. From there, they went by a taxi to Grant Road, entered Imperial Hotel behind Apsara Cinema at about 5 p.m., hired a room and were there in the hotel till about 6.30 p.m. and after coming out hired a taxi. The co-respondent drop­ped the respondent near Alankar Cinema and then went away. Then there is a refer­ence to what happened on 4-11-1971. Then comes reference to 6-11-1971, when one Dr. Kishoreb

Click Here to Read the rest of this document