V Vs. N

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In keeping with the views we expressed in our judgment in Family Court Appeal No. 29 of 2003, S v Y, decided on 23rd August 2013 in this matter, too, we have deliberately masked the names and identities of the parties so as to protect their privacy.

(2.) On 4th February 2002, the Family Court at Pune dismissed two petitions. One, P.A. 118 of 1998, was filed by the wife, N, for restitution of conjugal rights. The other, P.A. 280 of 2001, was filed by the husband, V, seeking divorce on the ground of cruelty under Section 13(1)(ia) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955. Both parties having filed separate appeals, these are decided together by this common judgment.

(3.) V and N were married on 25th December 1996 in Pune by Hindu Vedic rites and ceremonies. They have no children. V is the youngest of three brothers. He serves in the Telecom Department in Mumbai, where his family is based and where his brothers, too, work. He lives with his parents in a one-room-kitchen flat in Kurla. N is a clerk the Irrigation Department of the Government of Maharashtra. She and her family come from Pune. Her father is, or, at the relevant time, was an auto-rickshaw driver in Pune. It seems that before marriage, N agreed that she would seek and obtain a transfer from Pune to Mumbai where she and V would live together.