OM PATI Vs. KARTAR SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS order shall dispose of two connected appeals filed by Smt. Om Pati, against the judgments dated 15-7-1967 of Shri O. P. Sharma, Additional District Judge, Rohtak in two cross matrimonial petitions under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, between the appellant and her husband, Shri Kartar Singh, respondent. Proceedings had been consolidated with the consent of the parties and the two cases had been disposed of by one detailed judgment of the trial Court.

(2.) A marriage between the parties had been solemnised according to Hindu rites at the house of the bride's parents in village Kultana, Tehsil Jhajjar of Rohtak district on 15-6-1964. The bride's doll had been taken to the groom's house in village Daboda and the two had started living together as husband and wife soon after the marriage. It is the common ground that they could not live together happily for very long and the parties had finally separated within about two years of the marriage. According to the petitioner she had gone to her husband's house 3 times during this period and had lived therein all for a total duration of a month and a half in short spells. It was the petitioner's case that her husband and his parents were dissatisfied over the insufficient dowry that her parents had given her at the time of the marriage and that Kartar Singh respondent had last left her at her parents'' house in village Kultana somewhere in the year 1966, saying that is she wanted to live with him, she and her parents should satisfy the requirements of his parents and that she should bring more money to meet their demands. Om Pati was the first to file a petition under Section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, for restitution of conjugal rights against her husband in May, 1967, alleging that the respondent's parents had arranged another marriage for him and that the respondent had withdrawn from the society of the petitioner without reasonable cause with effect from August, 1966. Within a month of the filing of this petition, the respondent filed a cross-petition under Section 10 of the Act for judicial separation, on the ground that his wife, Om Pati, petitioner, had developed illicit intimacy with Sarvshri Ram Phal and Chander of village Daboda and had been seen having sexual intercourse with them a number of times by Kartar Singh himself and some other persons who have been named by him in his petition under Section 10 of the Act. it had been denied by Kartar Singh respondent in his written statement filed in reply to his wife's petition under Section 9 of the Act that he had ever proposed or intended a marriage with any other woman.

(3.) ONE Kamla Devi aged 16 years and her father Dharam Singh appeared on 16-6-1967, in answer to the notices issued by the trial Court and stated that a marriage had been fixed between Kamla Devi and Kartar Singh but as they had come to know for the first time that Kartar Singh was already married. , they had dropped the idea of going through with that marriage. Kartar Singh's counsel made a statement that his client was not going to marry Kamla Devi and Kartar Singh appeared personally the next day and denied that any marriage between him and Kamla Devi had been fixed as alleged. He stated that he had no intention of marrying any other woman in the lifetime of Om Pati or as long as this marriage was legally subsisting. This had put an end to one of the two grounds pleaded by Om Pati in her petition for restitution of conjugal rights. As regards the other ground that Kartar Sing respondent had withdrawn from Om Pati's society without reasonable cause, it was found that the evidence examined by Om Pati about the demand made by her husband or his parents for more money or dowry went beyond the pleadings. It was also found that there was no reliable proof that Om Pati or her parents had made any bona fide efforts, by taking Panchayats or otherwise, to get the petitioner rehabilitated in her husband's house. On the other hand the learned trial Judge held on the basis of oral testimony of some witnesses belonging to the respondent's village, that Om Pati was leading an unchastely life in adultery with Sarvshri Ram Phal and Chander and that she had actually been seen having sexual intercourse with them a number of times by about half a dozen persons. Ram Phal is a cousin of the respondent and was described as Om Pati's Dewar by Munshi Ram R. W. 4. The relationship could have led to some informality between the two but I find it difficult to believe that they had started cohabiting with doors open for people enmasse to surprise them in the act. It was unfortunate that oral and interested evidence has carried conviction with the learned trial Judge for holding that a lady had been guilty of acts of adultery. If inherently weak and unnatural evidence of this type was to be relied upon by courts, no fair name, reputation, freedom or property etc. , would have any sanctity. The trial Court may have had the advantage of seeing the demeanour of these witnesses, all hailing from the respondent's village, but the evidence is so unnatural that I have no hesitation in disbelieving it.