A husband's statement of having previously divorced his wife amounts to a declaration of divorce at least on the day the statement is made, regardless of the veracity of the statement.

1. In a proceeding by a Hanafi Muslim wife against her husband when he files a written statement contending that he bad divorced her on a previous day and that contention is found against does not the marriage between them become dissolved at least on the day when the written statement is filed? Our answer to it is in the affirmative and that for what is set out below.

2. Under Muhammadan law for a variety of reasons there are differences in the position of husband and wife as regards their rights when they are in the married state and in respect of divorce. The only condition necessary for the valid exercise of the right of divorce by a husband is that he must be a major and of sound mind at that time. He can effect divorce whenever he desires. Even if he divorces his wife under compulsion, or in jest, or in anger that is considered perfectly valid. No special form is necessary for effecting divorce under Hanafi law. The presence of the wife is not necessary at the time of the dissolution of the marriage. Witnesses are necessary for effecting a marriage, but not for dissolving it. Talaq is dissolution of marriage effected by the husband by repudiation. It is a release from the marriage tie. The husband can effect it by conveying to the wife that he is repudiating the alliance. It need not even be addressed to her. It takes effect the moment it comes to her knowledge. These principles are well-established.

3. S.147 in Tyabji's Muhammadan Law says that a single revocable talaq is effected if the expression is such as to imply that a talaq has already been effected. Illustration 10 to that Section reads as follows:

"(10) He says to his wife, 'Thou art repudiated yesterday.' She is divorced immediately if she was his wife 'yesterday', but not otherwise".

4. In the 2nd edition of Hamilton's translation of Hedaya it is stated as follows at page 79:

"If a man say to his wife, 'you are under divorce yesterday', and it should so be that he was married as this day, divorce does not take place at all, because he has here referred divorce to a period in which he was not competent to pronounce it, and therefore his divorce is nugatory, the same as if he were to say, 'you are under divorce before my existence.' But, in the present case, if he had married her before the time of which he speaks, divorce takes place at the time of his speaking; because, if a man signify a divorce in the preterite form, it is an indication in the present, and hence the divorce takes place accordingly, this expression being an indication of what is now, and not a relation of what is past as it does not appear that he pronounced any divorce yesterday, so as that he should now give intelligence thereof."

5. In the 3rd Edition of Macnaghten's Moohummudan Law, at page 296 under Case No. XLII the following question has been put and the answer given:

"Q. A person on the 20th of suffer in the year 1232, Hijree (corresponding with the 7th Pous of 1224, B. S) declared that he bad repudiated his wife by three divorces, agreeably to the rules of the Moohummudan Law, from the year 1178 or upwards of forty-six years back. In this case, from what date should the divorce be held to take effect?

R. Under the above circumstances, if the wife deny the fact of her having been divorced by the husband, the divorce according to Law, should be held to take effect from the date on which it was declared; as is laid down in the Shurbi Viqaya, 'If a person say to his wife, whom he married previously to the day to which he referred the divorce 'you are divorced yesterday', and she deny it, the divorce takes effect only from the moment of its being declared."

6. Following mainly the above question and answer from Macnaghten's Moohummudan Law it was held by the Bombay High Court in Chandbi v. Bandesha AIR. 1961 Bom.121 and the Allahabad High Court in Asmat Ullah v. Mt. Khatun-Unnisa 1939 All.592 that in an action by a Muslim wife against her husband when he filed a written statement that