KEWAL KUMAR Vs. PAWNA DEVI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By means of this petition, the Petitioner has challenged the order dated 26.08.2003 passed by the learned Senior Sub Judge, Kangra at Dharamshala whereby he has granted interim maintenance @ Rs. 500/- per month to the Petitioner (here-in-after referred to as the Respondent) w.e.f. April 1999 and has also directed the Petitioner to pay litigation expenses of Rs. 1,000/- to his wife, the Respondent.

(2.) The main ground of challenge is that the marriage between the parties stood dissolved by mutual consent according to customary law and therefore, the Senior Sub Judge did not have any jurisdiction to award compensation.

(3.) The undisputed facts are that Petitioner-husband married the Respondent on 4th December, 1998. According to the husband, the wife was pregnant at the time of marriage and therefore, the parties agreed to get the marriage dissolved by customary divorce and a Fharkhati Nama in this behalf was executed on 25.2.1999. The wife filed a petition under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure seeking maintenance, which was dismissed by the Judicial Magistrate 1st Class, Dharamshala, vide order dated 18.12.2000 holding that the marriage stood dissolved by mutual consent and the learned Magistrate found that the Respondent was living in adultery. The learned Sessions Judge also relied upon the divorce entered into mutually between the parties. During the course of the proceedings the husband has also filed an application No. 585 of 2008 and placed on record judgment of the Civil Judge (Jr. Division) 2, Dharamshala dated 15.3.2005 whereby the suit of the wife, seeking a declaration that there is a subsisting marriage between the parties, has been dismissed. This suit was dismissed on the ground that the marriage between the parties has been dissolved by a customary divorce in terms of the Fharkhati Nama.