SC throws out domestic violence case of divorcee

New Delhi: A couple from Punjab separated and obtained divorce by mutual consent but the woman filed a case against her exhusband under the Domestic Violence Act claiming that they continued to live together.
A Supreme Court bench on Tuesday quashed the case against Inderjit Singh Grewal and told the woman, Amandeep Kaur, that a case under the Act could not be maintained as long as the decree of divorce remained in force. The woman said that she and her husband had played a fraud on the court to obtain a divorce decree in 2008. “Even after getting divorce, both of us had been living together as husband and wife,” she contended and pleaded that the case was maintainable as they lived together. The bench noted that the two got married in 1998 and had a son in 1999. “There was no complaint by the wife against the husband of any cruelty or demand for dowry before getting decree of divorce by mutual consent on March 20, 2008,” it said.
The bench said the evidence produced by the wife could not be taken into account since the decree of divorce was in force.
“The contention advanced by her counsel that even after the decree of divorce, they continued to live together as husband and wife and therefore the complaint under DV Act is maintainable is not worth accepting at this stage,” said Justice Chauhan, writing the verdict.