The doctrine of comparative rectitude can be applied to determine the lesser blame-worthy party in cases of marital misconduct, allowing for divorce even when both parties are at fault.

JUDGMENT :

A.Muhamed Mustaque, J.

Where parties to divorce are in paridelicto, how the Court should approach to the ground for divorce urged in a petition filed by one of the spouses in a marriage, is the central issue in this appeal.

2. This case depicts conflict of personalities in a marital tie. The spouses had a short lived marital relationship lasting for ten days. The clash surfaced when the respondent-husband left the matrimonial home allegedly attributing mental torture he suffered during the time he spent with the appellant-wife. On a petition for divorce initiated by the respondent-husband on the ground of cruelty before the Family Court, the Court, noting the contents in the e-mail messages and in social media posts by the wife, opined that such contents amount to cruelty warranting a decree of divorce. In this appeal, the wife questions the decree granted.

3. Heard the learned counsel for the appellant Sri. C.R.Sivakumar and the learned counsel for the respondent Sri. V.John Mani.

4. The learned counsel for the appellant, Sri. C.R.Sivakumar, referred to the background of the marriage. According to him the parties came into contact through social networking website ‘Orkut’ some time in the year 2008. That acquaintance made them having intimate relationship including sexual relationship. According to the appellant-wife, it was an act of rape, on the pretext of promise to marry. The appellant-wife was working in Bangalore. She filed a complaint before the Nadakkav Police Station, Calicut, alleging rape. Thereafter, she withdrew the complaint as the parties agreed for marriage, following a settlement arrived between them. The marriage, accordingly, was solemnized on 25.09.2015 under the Special Marriage Act, 1954. The learned counsel for the appellant, Sri. C.R.Sivakumar, further pointed out that filing of an earlier petition by the husband as O.P No.135/2016 for declaring the marriage as null and void was dismissed on 27.02.2017 as the husband failed to prove the alleged fraud and coercion. It is submitted that after dismissal, a petition for divorce was filed on 3.03.2017, alleging cruelty. According to the learned counsel, the background as above clearly establishes the ground canvassed is illusory. According to him, the marriage itself was to get over the impending criminal prosecution and such a person cannot take the advantage of his own conduct to obtain divorce.

5. Per contra, the learned counsel for respondent-husband, Sri. V. John Mani, placing reliance on the e-mail messages sent to the husband and social media posts of the appellant-wife, argued that the respondent-husband suffered mental torture. It is also submitted that the respondent-husband has been denigrated among his friends and others, who had occasion to see such posts in the social media.

6. Cruelty, as a ground, referred to in the statutory provisions, allude to the fault of one of the spouses to make the opposite spouse to wriggle out from the marital relationship. Cruelty is recognized as a matrimonial guilt to allow a spouse, who suffered, to seek separation. This Court, in the peculiar facts of the case, is called upon to decide the validity of the decree granted to the husband, when sufficient indications are on record to prove the conduct of the husband as also blame worthy.

7. We shall refer to the findings on facts before answering the point of law noted as above. The respondent-husband never had real intention to marry the appellant-wife as deposed by him in the chief affidavit itself. It was a marriage created by circumstances resulted from lodging a criminal complaint by the appellant-wife before the police. After the marriage, the spouses lived together only for 10 days. The motive for the marriage, as far as the husband was concerned, was not genuine. The spouses belonged to different communities. The husband's disinterest spurred the wife to respond in the manner indicated in the impugned judgment. Exts.A1 and A2 series are the e-mail mess