ANAND PRAKSH DIXIT Vs. MALTI DIXIT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS Letters Patent Appeal has been preferred against the judgment of a learned single Judge dated 14 -12 -1983 whereby First Appeal No. 68 of 1983 preferred by the respondent a1!ainst a judgment and decree dated 29 -1 -1983 passed by IV Additional District Judge, Jabalpur, was allowed. The parties who are Hindus were married according to Hindu rights on 4 -3 -1978. A petition was subsequently instituted on 16 -8 -1979 by the appellant against the respondent for dissolution of marriage under section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) on two grounds (1) cruelty and (2) desertion. The petition was dismissed by the trial Court. The said Court held that the appellant had failed to prove the plea of desertion. It also recorded a finding that since the cause of action for the petition based on desertion was said to have arisen near about Diwali of the year 1978 and the petition had been instituted on 16 -2 -1979, it was liable to be dismissed inasmuch as the desertion had not been for a continuous period of not less than two years immediately preceding the presentation of the petition as contemplated by clause (ib) of sub -section (1) of section 13 of the Act.

(2.) AGGRIEVED by the judgment and decree of the trial Court, the appe1lant preferred an appeal in this Court. The appeal was dismissed on the ground that the petition in so far as it was raised on the plea of desertion could not be decreed as it had been filed before the prescribed period. Soon thereafter the appellant filed another petition on 6 -5 -1981 for dissolution of the marriage under section 13 of the Act again on the ground of desertion.

(3.) AS seen above section 21 of the Act have made the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure applicable to the proceedings under the Act subject to the other provisions contained in the Act or the Rules that may be framed by the High Court. Order XX, Rule of the Code of Civil Procedure provides that the decree shall also state the amount of costs incurred in the suit and by whom or out of what property and in what proportions such costs are to be paid, Rule 7 of Order XX on the other band contemplates that the decree shall bear the date on which the judgment was pronounced. and, when the Judge has satisfied himself that the decree has been drawn up in accordance with the judgment, he shall sign the decree. In exercise of the powers conferred by section 122 of the Code of Civil Procedure, this Court has framed rules regulating the procedure of the Courts subordinate to it known as M.P. Civil Courts Rules, 1961. Rule 173 of these Rules contemplates that decree shall ordinarily be prepared within three days of the judgment or order. Rule 176 read as hereunder: