PUSPANJALI JENA Vs. BANABIHARI JENA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is in challenge of the judgment dated 27.9.2013 passed by the learned Judge, Family Court, Puri in C.P. No.68 of 2013 declaring the marriage between the parties as void. The present appellant is the wife and she was the respondent before the learned court below. The husband is the respondent herein and he was the petitioner before the learned court below.

(2.) The husband filed the petition under Section 12 (1)(d) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1956 (for short, the Act) to declare the marriage void. It transpires from the appeal memo as well as the impugned judgment that marriage of the parties was solemnized on 28.12.2012 in a temple in presence of relatives of both the parties. The husband in his petition has alleged that after the marriage the wife came to her matrimonial home and stayed there till the 4th day of their marriage. On the third day of her marriage, the husband came to know that the wife was having pregnancy of nine months. Being confronted she admitted that she was pregnant. On the 4th day of the marriage the husband sent her back to her father's place with her brother and widow mother.

(3.) In response to the petition filed by the husband for seeking annulment of the marriage, the wife filed written statement wherein she pleaded, inter alia, that on the 4th day of their marriage and before the honeymoon night she left the house because against her will she was given in marriage to the petitioner, that on the 4th day of the marriage she left her matrimonial home with her widow mother and that she has given birth to a male child in the Capital Hospital at Bhubaneswar.