The provisions of Section 14(1) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, are directory and not mandatory, and a petition for divorce filed 9 days before the expiry of one year from the date of marriage is maintainable.

Bhattacharjee, J.

1. A petition under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 for dissolution of marriage by a decree of divorce filed by the appellant-husband against the respondent-wife on the ground of cruelty has been dismissed by the trial Court on merits as well as on the ground of the petition having been presented few days before the expiry of one year from the date of the marriage in contravention of the provisions of Section 14(1). My learned brother Banerjee, J. has, for the reasons stated in his judgment hereinafter, upheld the decision of the trial Judge on merits. While I respectfully agree with the view of Banerjee, J. that the petition has been rightly dismissed on merits and that the alleged cruelty by the wife has not been proved. I have my doubts as to whether the provisions of Section 14(1) prohibiting the entertainment of a petition for divorce before the expiry of one year from the date of marriage is that mandatory to require compliance with mathematical precision and to warrant rejection for any and every non-compliance. The provisions of Section 14(1) are reproduced herein below :

"14(1) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, it shall not be competent for any Court to entertain any petition for dissolution of a marriage by a decree of divorce, unless at the date of the presentation of the petition one year has elapsed since the date of the marriage. Provided that the Court may, upon application made to it in accordance with such rules as may be made by the High Court in that behalf, allow a petition to be presented before one year has elapsed since the date of the marriage on the ground that the case is one of exceptional hardship to the petitioner or of exceptional depravity on the part of the respondent, but, if it appears to the Court at the hearing of the petition that the petitioner obtained leave to present the petition by any misrepresentation or concealment of the nature of the case, the Court may, if it pronounces a decree, do so subject to the condition that the decree shall not have effect until after the expiry of one year from the date of the marriage or may dismiss the petition without prejudice to any petition which may be brought after the expiration of the said one year upon the same or substantially the same facts as those alleged in support of the petition to dismissed."

2. THESE provisions and their counter-part in Section 29(1) of the Special Marriage Act, 1954, are not Indian innovat ons, but are the results of blind imitation, so often resorted to by us, of British Legislations. There is no corresponding provision in the Indian Divorce Act of 1869 governing the Christians or the Parsi Marriage and Divorce Act of 1936, governing the Parsis, the obvious reason being that when those legislations were enacted, we had no such provisions in the corresponding British Laws to serve as our guide or. model. THESE provisions were introduced in United Kingdom for the first time by the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1937, and continued to be retained in the successive Matrimonial Causes Acts of 1950, of 1965 and of 1973. THESE provisions came to be known as "Fair Trial to Marriage Rule", the avowed object being to prevent hasty divorce proceedings resorted to rashly and in the heat of passion and to require the spouses to give a trial to the marriage for a period of three years so that the heated passion may spend up and calm of mind is restored and marriages are maintained for the stability of the Society.

It is not easy to appreciate the objects of these provisions. The Courts have been mandated by the Legislature (vide. Section 23(2) and (3) of the Hindu Marriage Act, Section 34(2) and (3) of the Special Marriage Act and now Section 9 of the Family Courts Act, 1984), to make every endeavour to bring about reconciliation between the parties and that should go a long way to prevent rash and hasty divorces. But otherwise, a blanket interdiction against initiation of divorce proce