A Hindu marriage is solemnized when the essential ceremonies prescribed by law or approved by established customs are performed. Merely going through certain ceremonies with the intention that the parties be taken to be married will not make the ceremonies prescribed by law or approved by any established customs.

( 1 ) THIS appeal has been preferred by an unfortunate girl who, though was born with a golden spoon in her mouth because of her own follies, not only suffered herself, but also lowered down the prestige of her family in the society to a great extent.

( 2 ) ). The appellant filed a suit in the City Civil Court at Calcutta for declaration that no marriage between her and the respondent was performed according to the Hindu rites or otherwise at any place and also for a declaration that the registration of the alleged marriage between her and the respondent and the certificate granted by the marriage officer on 1st January, 1993 under Section 16 of the Special Marriage Act was void and inoperative and also for permanent injunction. The said suit, however, was registered as Matrimonial Suit No. 121 of 1994.

( 3 ) THE case as made out by the plaintiff-girl in the plaint inter alia, was that she was born on or about 6th November, 1971 in an affluent family, is the only child of her parents. She, after passing the High Secondary Examination from the Loreto House School in 1990, took admission in B. Com. Part-I course and in 1991 joined a tuition centre near Richi Road, Calcutta to receive tuition and there she met the respondent-boy, who also joined the same tuition centre while reading in B. Com. Part-I course in the St. Xaviers College and friendship grew between them.

( 4 ) THE girl's further case was, that the boy gave out that he had a brilliant academic carrier and he too belonged to a rich family and was a partner in his family business and she was also introduced by the boy to his parents. Subsequently, towards the middle of 1992, the boy told her that he loved her and was ready to sacrifice everything including his life for her and wanted to marry her, but the girl refused as she considered the boy just as a friend and nothing else and she had no intention to marry him. The girl also tried to gradually dis-associate herself from the boy.

( 5 ) SUBSEQUENTLY, on or about 1st January, 1993, the boy enticed the girl to accompany him to an unknown place and took out some photographs of him and the girl in a pre-arranged setting and then took her to an office close to the Coffee House in College Street and obtained her signatures on some forms without disclosing the contents thereof and also took certain photographs of the girl in the said office and then declared that both had become husband and wife, but asked the girl to keep everything secret.

( 6 ) BY that time, the girl had joined a Chartered Accountancy Firm to undergo accountancy course and she was to go out Calcutta with the partners of the said firm in the middle of May, 1993, in connection with audit works, when the boy asked her to be ready to remain absent from her house for a day to undo the aforesaid forms and papers and the alleged marriage. As she was in great mental agony, she agreed to act according to the boy's dictates to get her released of her mental agony. The boy then on 15th May, 1993 took her at his small and conjested flat at 25, Ratan Sarkar Garden Street, Calcutta, where she was greeted by the parents and relations of the boy who told her that since her marriage was complete, she would not leave the house without performing the ceremonies according to their family custom, and she was thus compelled to stay there till 2nd June, 1993.

( 7 ) DURING her stay, the boy and his parents exercised pressure upon the girl to bring about Rs. 15 lacs from her parents for the purpose of purchasing a suitable flat for their living, but as she flatly refused, they tried to ill treat her and compelled her to do all household works including washing of utensils much against her will.

( 8 ) DURING her said stay at 25, Ratan Sarkar Garden Street, she had also to yield to the pressure of the boy to allow him to have sex with her in the night of 15th May, 1993 and as she resisted his similar attempts on the 2nd and 3rd June,1993, she was beaten by the boy,