Form No. J(2)

In the High Court at Calcutta Civil Appellate Jurisdiction Appellate Side Present: The Hon’ble Justice Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya And The Hon’ble Justice Uday Kumar FAT 98 of 2025 IA No: CAN 1 of 2025 CAN 2 of 2025 CAN 3 of 2025 CAN 4 of 2025 Smt. Roshni Saha Vs.

Sri Mainack Saha For the appellant : Mr. Debjit Mukherjee, Mr. Akash Dutta For the respondent : Mr. Srijib Chakraborty, Mr. Subhasis Chakraborty, Mr. Amit Chowdhury, Ms. Sushmita Kumari Singh, Mr. Aditya Mondal Heard on : 01.07.2025 Judgment on : 01.07.2025 Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya, J.:-

1. The present appeal, against an ex parte divorce decree obtained by the respondent/husband against the appellant/wife has been preferred after a delay of about 269 days from the expiry of the statutory limitation period.

2. CAN 1 of 2025 has been filed for condonation of delay in preferring the appeal, whereas CAN 3 of 2025 is an application for amendment of the pleadings made in the condonation application.

3. Upon hearing learned counsel for the parties and going through the pleadings, including the affidavits in opposition and reply filed to the applications, we find that the reason furnished by the appellant/wife for the delay was initially that she had gone to the Court of the ACJM, Barrackpore on January 09, 2025, when the respondent/husband was released on bail, and during the course of such hearing, the petitioner came to know of the existence of the impugned judgment and decree. Subsequently, during hearing of the condonation application by this Court on a prior date, the wife was confronted with the order granting bail to the husband, from which it was evident that the wife and/or any Advocate on her behalf was not present in the criminal court when bail was granted to the respondent/husband.

4. This, admittedly, prompted the wife to file an amendment application to the condonation of delay application. In the amendment application, the appellant/wife admits that during the course of hearing before this Court, when confronted with the bail order, it was discovered that the pleading made in the application for condonation was erroneous. The wife, in CAN 3 of 2025, seeks an amendment to the pleadings in paragraph no. 5 of the original condonation application to the effect that the respondent/husband had surrendered before the ACJM, Barrackpore on 9.1.2025 and was released on bail and that during the course of “such criminal proceedings before the police authorities”, the appellant/wife first came to know of the existence of the impugned judgment and ex parte decree of divorce.

5. The amendment application, even if allowed, would give rise to an absurd proposition. It is an admitted position, as also evident from the annexures to the pleadings, that bail was granted to the respondent by the ACJM, Barrackpore in court premises on January 09, 2025. As such, there could not have been any occasion for the wife to become aware of the divorce decree in any “criminal proceedings before police authorities”.

6. In fact, it is unheard of that any “criminal proceeding” is conducted before the Police.

7. The appellant/wife also seeks to project before the Court that she was called by the Nimta Police Station for inquiry on the basis of a complaint lodged by her against her husband on January 08, 2025, when she came to know of the divorce decree.

8. However, it is completely unexplained as to how the police authorities became aware of the divorce decree obtained by the husband ex parte, where the wife herself pleads that she did not have any knowledge of the same.

9. The respondent/husband also relies on a criminal complaint lodged by the appellant/wife by way of an application under Section 175(3) of the BNSS before the learned Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Barrackpore on December 26, 2024, eleven days after the husband contracted a remarriage upon obtaining the divorce decree and waiting for expiry of the statutory appeal period. The said remarriage was contracted on December