BALDEV RAJ MIGLANI Vs. URMILA KUMARI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant's petition under Section 12 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 for the annulment of his marriage with the respondent on the ground that at the date of the marriage (October 8, 1962) the respondent was already pregnant by some other man, of which he was ignorant then, was decreed by the trial Court on August 26, 1963 but on appeal the decree was reversed and his petition was dismissed by a learned single Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court on February 20. 1968; a Letters Patent appeal by the appellant was summarily dismissed by the Division Bench of that Court on August23, 1968. Hence this appeal by special.leave.

(2.) Few admitted facts in the case may be stated:The appellant was married to the respondent on October 8, 1962 at Patiala. After the marriage he cohabited with the respondent on few occasions but on October 30. 1962 he came to know that the respondent was already pregnant. After that revelation he had no cohabitation with her but immediately on the following day i.e. November 1, 1962 he filed the petition praying annulment of his marriage on the aforesaid ground. The respondent contended that she became pregnant from the appellant and the she never had sexual intercourse with any other person. Admittedly, the respondent delivered a male child on May 20, 1963, which according to the appellant, was a full term and mature delivery. The question that arose before the lower Courts was whether the respondent at the time of her marriage with the appellant was pregnant by some person other than the appellant or whether the pregnancy, which ultimately resulted in the delivery of a male child on May 20, 1963, was a result of marital relations between the parties between October 8, 1962 (the date of marriage) and October 30, 1962 (when the respondent's pregnancy got revealed for the first time). Besides the oral evidence furnished by the parties themselves, medical evidence of experts was also furnished on either side. On an appreciation of the evidence that was led before it the trial Court came to the conclusion that the respondent at the time of her marriage with the appellant was pregnant by some person other than the appellant, that the appellant at the time of the marriage was ignorant of that fact and that since the discovery by the appellant was entitled to a decree of nullity of the existence of such pregnancy of the respondent the appellant had no sexual intercourse with her and, therefore, the appellant was entitled to a decree of nullity of the marriage. In appeal preferred by the respondent the learned single Judge of the High Court took the view that the child delivered by the respondent on May 20, 1963 had not been conclusively established by the appellant to be an illegitimate one and, therefore, he allowed the appeal. The question before us in this appeal is whether the appellant could be said to have discharged the burden that lay upon him to prove that the respondent was at the date of the marriage pregnant by some person other than himself. After going through the entire material on record we are clearly of the view that the appellant has satisfactorily discharged the burden which lay upon him and the trial Court's decree deserves to be restored.

(3.) In order to appreciate the evidence on record two crucial dates must be kept in mind, namely, October 8, 1962, being the date of the marriage between the parties and the May 20, 1963, the date on which the respondent delivered a son. It was nobody's case that the appellant had access to the respondent before the date of the marriage and even according to the respondent's case the sexual relations between the two commenced on October 9, 1962 and did not last beyound October 30, 1962. In other words, according to the respondent, the pregnancy if it was as a result of sexual relations with the appellant could commence not earlier than October 9, 1962. The question is whether that case of the respondent is true or the appellant's case that the respondent was pregnant since before the date of marriage is true