MEENA DEVI Vs. SURAJ PARKASH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal is directed against judgment and decree dated 2. 11. 1987, of the District Judge, Karnal, dismissing appellant's petition under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, hereinafter referred to as the Act. The appellant-petitioner Smt. Meena Devi was married to Suraj Parkash respondent on February 27,1982 at Panipat according to Hindu rites. The couple lived as husband and wife at Panipat. Thereafter they shifted to Ludhiana in connection with the employment of the husband. They returned to Panipat. No child was born to the couple. The case of the wife is that after one year of marriage, the respondent started harassing her in order to extract a sum of Rs. 2,000/- and a bicycle. The petitioner's father being a person of modest means could not satisfy the above demand. What is more, the respondent-husband was given to bad habits like drinking and gambling. Ultimately the respondent turned out the petitioner from the matrimonial home on September 5, 1985, and thereafter she has been living at the sufferance of her parents. It was further pleaded that the respondent, knew one Dharam Pal constable posted in Police Station Panipat. With his help the respondent got summoned the petitioner and her parents on a number of occasions to the police station and they were made to sit there, resulting in great mental agony to the petitioner and here parents. Ultimately, in order to avoid such a situation, the petitioner filed a complaint dated December 8, 1985, Exhibit P-1, to the Deputy Commissioner and it was only thereafter that harassment through the police caused, by the respondent stopped. The petitioner prayed for dissolution of her marriage with the respondent on the ground of cruelty.

(2.) THE petition was contested. The main averments were controverted. It was pleaded by the husband that, in fact, it was the petitioner who had herself left the matrimonial home and gone away to her parents house, which was at a distance of about one furlong at Panipat. He further stated that the petitioner had instituted a complaint under Sections 406/498-A of the Indian Penal Code, but the same was dismissed in default on January 31,1986. She also instituted an application- under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure in November 1985, which was pending. It was -further pleaded that the couple had gone to Ludhiana in March 1984. in connection with employment of the respondent and they lived there till March/april 1985 when they returned to Panipat. After coming back from there, the petitioner insisted that the respondent lived separately from his parents or with her own parents. The respondent was not willing to do so but ultimately agreed and lived with his parents-in-law. The behaviours of his parents-in-law was not good towards him and, therefore, after a few months he left their house and started living separately. This was not to the liking of the petitioner's parents and this started a chain of litigation. The respondent added that he was always ready and willing to keep the petitioner with him.

(3.) IN the replication filed by the wife, the material averments made in the written statement were controverted.