1. The matrimonial misfortune, of a Muslim couple, Mammu Koya and Mariyambi, has forced its way into court from both ends, each spouse institu-ting a lawsuit, the husband soliciting the wife's society in an action for restitu-tion of conjugal rights and the wife demanding a divorce snapping the ties between the two as intolerable to continue. The tragic feature of this marital estrangement is that a child born to the couple has to share the mishap by being denied the healthy environs of a happy parental home.

2. The parties are relatively young although the profile of their conjugal life bears scars and wounds which form the subject-matter of the two suits. According to the husband, (who is the plaintiff in O. S. No. 213 of 1962, which has given rise to S. A. No. 281 of 1970) his wife (the 2nd defendant in the suit, her father being the 1st defendant) was living with him in comparative quiet and a son was born to them. The lady left for her father's house with the child some two years before the suit and did not return. The husband was not allowed access to his father-in-law's house and thus, without reason, the wife has withdrawn her consortium thanks to the wrongful ob