The court emphasized that custody arrangements must prioritize the child's best interests and safety, allowing interim custody to the father while ensuring safeguards are in place.

JUDGMENT :

DEVAN RAMACHANDRAN, J.

The petitioner assails Ext.P11 order of the learned Family Court, Chavara, primarily to the extend that it did not give him overnight custody of his child, but confined it to only visitation, that too, for a few hours within the court premises.

2. Smt.Sulfia M.A – learned counsel for the petitioner, submitted that the learned Family Court has pre-judged all the relevant issues while delivering Ext.P11 order because, it appears to have proceeded on the assumption that the child will not be safe with her client at his residence, since his mother and sister are also residing along with him. She explained that a case has been registered against the appellant’s mother and sister on the complaint of the respondent; then and that for this sole reason, this Court obtained a wrong impression that the child will not be safe with them. She then argued that Ext.P11 is also in error since it has directed the child to be in custody of the father within the premises of the Court, even though this Court has, in Indu v. Thomas @ Manoj [ 2025(3) KHC 295 ], made it clear that children should not be ordinarily exposed to such places. He thus prayed that Ext.P11 be set aside and the child be given in interim custody to her client for a few days, until his school reopens.

3. In response, the learned counsel for the respondent – Sri.P.Bijimon, submitted that his client has no objection if the petitioner stays in Chavara or Thiruvananthapuram, while being in custody of the child for a few days. He then said that his client has come back to India, but that her mother is having a surgery at “Fort Hospital”, Thiruvananthapurm on 28.05.2025. He added that, therefore, the child can be given in custody to the petitioner from tomorrow for a few days, provided a condition be imposed that he will not be taken to his mother and sister.

4. It is thus obvious that the respondent has no real objection to the child being in interim custody of the father; but the controversy is whether his mother and sister can meet him. We are aware that, in Ext.P6 order - earlier issued by the learned Family Court - it has recorded the submissions of the respondent that if the child is taken to the residence of the petitioner, it may adversely affect his personal and mental condition, because his mother and sister are arrayed as accused in a criminal case registered against them by the respondent herein.

5. However, we fail to understand how such reasoning should be made because, even taking it - as submitted by both sides – that the parties have filed criminal cases against each other, the denial to the child the opportunity of meeting his father, or his grandmother and Aunt, would be normally untenable. We are of the view that the best interests of the child would not behoove a situation where he is made to feel scared of any person. The disputes between his parents, or between their relatives, cannot be allowed to leave a scar on the psyche of the child;

6. That said, both sides agree that the child can be exchanged from the front of the residential house of the mother.

7. The only surviving question is whether we must constrain the petitioner from taking the child outside Chavara or Thiruvananthapuram - as the case may be. We have little doubt that such a constraint is unnecessary because, the apprehensions of the mother can be allayed by providing safe guards for the full safety and well being of the child, even if he is taken to the residence of the father.

We thus allow this Original Petition and modify Ext.P11; thus allowing the petitioner to be in the interim custody of the child from 10 AM on 27.05.2025 till 5 P.M. on 30.05.2025. The place of exchange of the child for this purpose shall be in front of the residential gate of the mother.

At this juncture, we must say that we are in disapproval of the learned Family Court in having allowed the interaction between the petitioner and the son within the Court premises, since it goes contrary to the di