MAJOR BHUPINDER SINGH MALHI Vs. HARPREET KAUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appeal is against the dismissal of the petition for divorce on the ground that the wife was guilty of cruelty and desertion. The marriage took place on 18.02.1990 and through the marriage, a male child was born on 21.11.1990. The complaint of the husband was that the respondent was short-tempered and used to fight for every small reason and that she used to humiliate him in the presence of his colleagues. He is an army personnel and had been posted in Kanpur in 1991 and then in Jammu and Kashmir in 1992 and later, he was posted at Suratgarh (Rajasthan). The wife had been left in her parents house because he could not shift to the place of his posting due to exigencies of service. Subsequently when he was allotted with accommodation, the wife refused to join him despite repeated requests. She would not even allow the husband to visit his father when he was at Canada and when he was still ailing. His father had later expired in November 1993, but the wife did not visit him even to offer condolence. Later, he was posted at Kupwara (Jammu and Kashmir), but he could not take his wife to that place and, therefore, he had requested the wife to stay with his widowed mother alone. Even on occasions when he would return home to live, the wife could not come to live with him. She ultimately left the matrimonial home in December 1992 on the pretext that she had to look after her father and took away all dowry articles. She also insisted that he must transfer the registration of maruti car in her name and had also taken the car with her. She was giving several complaints against him with the army authorities and brought down his esteem in their eyes. The complaint of the appellant was that she had done several acts of cruelty and she had intentionally deserted the husband and he was, therefore, entitled to a decree of divorce.

(2.) The wife had denied all these allegations. She would, on the other hand, state that the husband never desired to keep his wife in his company. He had always petulant in his ways with her and liked to stay away from the house as long as possible. She had lived with him in Kanpur in 1991 and then later in Jammu and Kashmir in 1992. She would, however, deny that she never visited the appellant at the time of his father s death to express condolence and would state that she was actually living with him in the very same house where her fatherin- law died at that time. As regards the allegations that the wife wanted the registration of the maruti car to be transferred in her name, she would state that the car had been purchased by her father in the name of the appellant and she had never demanded the change of registration in her name. All her dowry articles were still lying in the house of the appellant. As regards the contention that she had prevented the husband from going to visit his father when he was in Canada, she would state that the appellant wanted to desert the army and immigrate to Canada. His attempt was to completely neglect the wife and child and shift to a foreign base. If she had approached the army higher officials, it was only to secure to her and to her child maintenance.

(3.) After the filing of the written statement, she had filed an amendment to the written statement to include the details of the fact that the appellant had married yet another woman by name Anju Puri and still later to a person by name Ginny Jindal. She had come to know about it subsequent to the filing of the statement. This application for amendment was originally refused and later permitted to be filed by an order of this Court in Civil Revision No.5233 of 2008.