ASHISH WADHWA Vs. NIDHI WADHWA AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This petition under Article 226/227 of the Constitution of India has been filed seeking the following reliefs:-

(2.) The necessary facts for disposal of the present petition in short are that the petitioner as well as the respondent No.1 were married on 13/04/2019 at Gwalior and they are blessed with one son. It appears that some dispute arose between the parties and accordingly, the respondents filed an application under Section 125 of CrPC for grant of maintenance on the ground that the respondent No.1 is being harassed by the petitioner and his family members for demand of dowry and it was also mentioned in the application that the respondent No.1 has filed an application under Section 12 of the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act which is still pending and the petitioner is posted in Bangalore and he is an engineer by profession and his monthly salary is Rs.1 lac and he has a share in the house situated at Gwalior and he has no other liability except the respondents. It was further mentioned that the respondent No.1 has no source of income and for herself and for her son, she is dependent on her old and infirm parents and accordingly, it was prayed that an amount of Rs.35,000/- may be awarded for the maintenance of respondent No.1 and an amount of Rs. 15,000/- may be awarded for the maintenance of respondent No.2 and the cost of lis to the extent of Rs.30,000/- was also claimed.

(3.) It appears that the respondents filed an application for grant of interim maintenance, however, before the application for grant of interim maintenance could be decided, the petitioner filed an application under Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act for transfer of case from the Court of Hitendra Singh Sisodiya, Additional Principal Judge, Family Court, Gwalior on the ground that he comes from Bangalore to attend the Court proceedings and in spite of that, the respondent No.1 is not interested in early disposal of the case and with an intention to harass the petitioner, is not cooperating. It appears from the order dated 08/02/2019, the Principal Judge, Family Court, Gwalior transferred the case to the Link Court on the ground that since on two occasions, the petitioner had come from Bangalore, therefore, the Trial Court should have referred the matter for reconciliation and should not have adjourned it as it has resulted in undue harassment to the petitioner. Thereafter, it appears that the application for grant of interim maintenance was allowed. However, the petition which has been filed by the petitioner does not contain the relevant facts. It appears that after the interim maintenance was allowed, the petitioner filed an application under Section 127(2) of CrPC for alteration of maintenance amount and it is alleged that on 29/07/2019 the petitioner was informed that the order on the application filed under Section 127(2) of CrPC would be delivered on 20/08/2019 and, therefore, the Advocates of the both parties noted the next date as 20/08/2019. It is further pleaded that however, on 30/07/2019, the record of the case was sent to the Court of Principal Judge, Family Court without any prior notice or intimation to the petitioner and on 20/08/2019, when the petitioner appeared before the Trial Court, then he was informed that the case has been transferred to the Court of Principal Judge, therefore, he should attend the Court of Principal Judge, Family Court, Gwalior. On 20/08/2019 itself, the petitioner appeared before the Court of Principal Judge, Family Court, Gwalior and he was asked to sign the order sheets and accordingly, he obeyed the verbal order and signed the order sheets and he was informed by the Office that the next date of hearing is 26/9/2019. It is further mentioned that because of current situation, the petitioner is under stress and unable to focus on his job hunting and also due to uncertainty of hearing dates, he is unable to travel to other city for appearing in job interview. It is further mentioned that the petitioner collected all the order sheets in order to get the information about the proceedings and after going through the order sheet dated 28/08/2019, the petitioner came to know that the Trial Court i.e. Judge, Link Court, Family Court ,Gwalior had observed that he does not want to hear the matter and, therefore, a letter may be written to the Principal Judge, Family Court for transfer of the case. Thus, it is submitted that not only the valuable time of the Court was lost but the petitioner has also suffered. It is further submitted that now, the case has been again transferred to the Court of Hitendra Singh Sisodiya, from whose Court, the case was earlier transferred to the Court of Judge, Link Court, Family Court, Gwalior. It is submitted that the petitioner is jobless and currently searching for career opportunities and therefore, early hearing and disposal of the case is necessary. Although the Advocates of both the parties on all the dates had remained present before the Court but the applications have been kept pending for arguments and disposal. On 20/08/2019 when the case was listed before the Link Court, Family Court, Gwalior, again he wrote a letter to the Principal Judge for transfer of the case. When the petitioner came to know about the letter written by the Judge for transfer of the case, he became mentally disturbed because of non-clarity of hearing and arguments and he is unable to focus on his job searching and the Trial Court after considering the prayer of the petitioner has not heard the matter and again wrote a letter for transfer of the case. Under these circumstances, this petition has been filed seeking reliefs mentioned above.