AVADH BEHARI ROHATGI J.

( 1 ) THE whole and sole question in this appeal is whether the husband, whom the wife calls a womaniser and a drunkard is entitled to a decree of divorce on the ground of wife s cruelty. A learned single Judge of this Court on facts has returned the finding in favour of the husband. From his decree the wife appeals to this Court.

( 2 ) THE parties were married on 6-6-1971. On 19-6-78 they separated and have since then been living apart. There are four daughters of the marriage. They are in the custody of the husband. The husband filed the petition for divorce in June 1979 on the ground of cruelty. In the petition in para 55 the husband alleged that at a meeting held on 3-7-1978 in the presence of the parties relations when negotiations for the resettlement of the parties were afoot the wife lost her temper and started abusing him and called him a womaniser and a heavy drunkard. She complained in the meeting that the husband has been bringing girls in the matrimonial home. As a result of the imputations and accusations the talks of reconciliation broke down. This was the husband s positive case in the petition. In her written statement the wife replied that she never falsely accused the character of the petitioner suggesting thereby that the charges levelled against the husband were not false.

( 3 ) WHEN the case came to trial the wife in her evidence repeated these charges times out of number. In her statement she named three girls with whom the husband had extramarital relations. They were Rupa, Mamta and Alka Sayal. According to her they are just few examples of conjual infidelities of the husband. About Rupa, the wife said that she was a cabaret dancer. When the parents of the husband were away to Simla one night the husband brought Rupa to the house and started drinking with her. The wife was present. Afterwards the husband wanted to indulge in sex with Rupa. This the wife could not stand. So in utter disgust she withdraw herself from the room where the husband and Rupa were staying. Rupa stayed for the whole night, she says.

( 4 ) MAMTA is another girl of ill-repute with whom the husband carried on. The wife said that Mamta worked in the husband s office in Kamla Nagar. "i have seen Mamta myself when she came 10 our house. " She said in evidence.

( 5 ) REGARDING Alka Sayal the wife narrated that she was working in the factory of the husband at Naraina. She stated that her husband had married her and she was pregnant from him. She wanted to prove all this in Court. Alka Sayal s father, wife alleged, came to her father and was prepared to give evidence in the case to prove the husband s lecherous character. The wife accordingly made an application for amendment of the written statement. This was allowed. She set up the case of husband s adulterous association with Alka. Then she wanted an opportunity to produce Alka s father in evidence. This was also given. But Alka s father was never produced in the case.

( 6 ) THE trial Judge has disbelieved the evidence of the wife. He had the advantage, denied to us, of seeing her in the witness box, He found her a woman of aggressive nature. He found as a fact that the accusations are false and unjustified. About Rupa he says that it is a story invented by the wife in order to malign the husband. The building in which the husband was staying had more than 20 flats. Most of them were occupied by judicial officers and colleagues of the husband s father. The husband s father was at the relevant time an Additional District Judge in Delhi. Just opposite the husband s father flat was the flat of their near relation. In this environment it seems most unlikely that the husband will bring a cabaret dancer to the flat who will stay throughout the night in the house in wife s presence. The case of husband s sexual relationship with Mamta and Alka Sayal equally remained unproved. There is no cogent evidence on the record that the husband was a philanderer or that he was

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