Latest Judgement

An article researched and authored by Advocate Aarun Chanda

1. The Hon’ble Supreme Court Bench in a recent judgment i.e. Shlok Bhardwaj V/s Runika Bhardwaj & Others, observed that if a wife takes divorce by mutual consent with no reservation for liberty by her to continue criminal cases against her husband and his family members, then the wife is estopped from continuing cruelty proceedings.
2. The Hon’ble Supreme Court observed that once the warring couple settle their disputes through mutual consent divorce, then no further dispute survives between the spouses, even if it was not specifically written in the divorce decree. If the wife fails to reserve her rights in the divorce petition to prosecute the husband after the divorce, then she does not have any right to pursue legal remedy by continuing criminal cases against the husband.
3. In a matter within one year of marriage, the husband filed for divorce and the wife filed a criminal case under Section. 498A and Dowry Prohibition Act. The husband and his family members were tried by the Judicial Magistrate and all of them were acquitted. Later both the parties agreed to take divorce by mutual consent. The wife at the time of taking divorce by mutual consent did not press for maintenance or reserve her right to prosecute the husband and his family members after divorce. The wife and the husband remarried after taking a divorce and the wife approached Allahabad High Court for revision of the acquittal order passed in the favour of the ex-husband. The Allahabad High Court committed the criminal case to the lower court for trial. The matter reached the Hon’ble High Court and the said court concluded that wife is estopped from pursuing criminal cases after taking divorce by mutual consent without reserving her rights to pursue criminal cases even after divorce.
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