SMT. SAROJ RANI VS SUDARSHAN KUMAR CHADHA

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CITATION	1984 SC 1562
DATE OF JUDGMENT	8^thAUGUST, 1984
COURT	SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
APPELLANT	SMT. SAROJ RANI
RESPONDENT	SUDARSHAN KUMAR CHADHA
BENCH	Justice Sabyasachi Mukherji, Justice Syed Murtaza Fazal Ali.

STATUTES INVOKED:

India’s Constitution of 1950

The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955

INTRODUCTION

Marriage is regarded as a sacrament in India, with the man and woman being married becoming connected inside one relationship and being viewed as one soul. When a man and a woman marry, they observe particular cultural and religious practices that bind them together for the rest of their lives. They are said to be living together till their last breath, sharing all of their joys and sorrows and being each other’s support.

Consider the following scenario: two people marry, and after the marriage, the husband abandons the woman and moves somewhere without explaining or providing a solid explanation. In this case, the woman who abandoned her family and married the man with so many hopes is left with broken dreams and hearts. In this scenario, the woman has every right to file a court action to force her husband to live with her and provide her with a life in which she does not feel abandoned by her spouse. This legal privilege is not only available to women, but a man can also exercise it if his wife withdraws from the husband’s society without providing a fair explanation.

The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 (HMA) imposes specific obligations and privileges on married couples in their marriage. It is assumed in a marriage that the man and woman will live together after marriage. Both sides in a marriage have the right to seek comfort from their spouse, and if one of the spouses fails to meet their commitments in an unreasonable manner, the other spouse has the right to seek redress to compel him or her to do so.

Hindu Marriage Act 1955- section 9- Constitution of India- Articles 13, 14, and 21- legislation inconsistent with or in derogation of the basic rights, right to equality, right to life, and personal liberty. The recovery of conjugal rights is addressed under Section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act. When either the husband or the wife has withdrawn from the society of the other without reasonable excuse, the aggrieved party may petition the district court for restitution of conjugal rights, and the court, if satisfied with the truth of the statements made in such petition and that there is no legal ground why the application should not be granted, may decree restitution of conjugal rights accordingly.

FACTS OF THE CASE

The wife filed a suit for recovery of conjugal rights under Section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955.
The respondent Sudarshan Kumar then filed a declaration in court requesting that the petitioner Saroj Rani’s plea be granted, claiming that he had neither kicked the petitioner’s wife out of his home nor removed her from her social circle. As a result, the court issued the ruling restoring the couples’ marital rights.
Following that, the husband filed a divorce petition against the wife under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, claiming that one year had passed from the date of the order for recovery of conjugal rights due to the parties’ lack of cohabitation.
The divorce petition was dismissed by the district judge because the judgment for recovery of marital rights was a consent decree. Dissatisfied with the judgment, the spouse filed an appeal before the top court.
The appeal was granted, and the husband was awarded a divorce decree. The matter was appealed to the Supreme Court.

GENESIS OF RESTITUTION OF CONJUGAL RIGHTS

The notion of restoration of marital rights was acquired from English law and incorporated into Indian law. Wife and husband were recognized as one entity in English law; hence a wife could not sue her husband or vice versa. The remedy for restitution of marital rights originated in the Western Ecclesiastical Courts. Such courts, by a decision of restitution of marital rights, obliged the obstinate spouse to fulfill the appropriate responsibility to the complaining spouse. Later, the remedy was recognized in England by the various Matrimonial Causes Acts that were introduced from time to time.

These rights were transmitted down from England to her different colonies, onto which her Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence was grafted, and India was no exception. The clause was never part of Hindu, Sikh, Muslim, or Parsi law, but it was introduced into India by the British through judicial declarations.

In the absence of statute legislation, Indian courts issued decisions restoring marital rights to all faith sects.

ISSUE RAISED

Is the husband eligible for a divorce decree?
Section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 is constitutional.

CONTENTIONS OF APPELANT

The chief allegation of the appellant was that as per provision of Section 23 the further party could not grasp the edge of his wrong because of having refused cohabitation in the execution of the decree.
The Appellant further argued that the Respondent always intended to divorce her, and thus did not object to the decree for restitution of conjugal rights with the view to dishonor it and ultimately be granted a divorce on those grounds therefore he cannot be allowed to grasp the edge of his wrong.
The appellant challenged the constitutionality of Section 9 of Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 relying on the case of. T. Sareetha v. Venkata Subbaiah which held restitution of conjugal rights as unconstitutional as it violated the right to privacy of choice and autonomy under Article 21 of the Constitution.

CONTENTIONS OF RESPONDENT

The respondent contends that the Restitution of Conjugal right is constitutional by referring to the decision of Delhi High Court in Smt. Harvinder Kaur v. Harmander Singh Choudhry.

JUDGEMENT

In the matter of “T. Saritha v. Venkata Subbaiah,” a learned single judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court issued a ruling. The learned court had remarked that the remedy of restitution of marital rights provided for by Section 9 of the said Act was a barbaric and brutal remedy that violated the constitutionally established right to privacy and human dignity guaranteed by Article 21. As a result, Section 9 was declared unconstitutional by the learned court. Article 13 of the Constitution requires that any statutory measure that restricts the rights provided by Part III of the Constitution be deemed unlawful. As a result, the learned court concluded that the decision for restitution of conjugal rights flagrantly violated the right to privacy protected by Article 21.

The learned court observed, and this is an important issue, that an order for restitution of marital rights can only be enforced under Order 21 Rule 32 of the Code of Civil Procedure. He also resorted to certain trends in American law and concluded that Section 9 of the aforementioned Act was null and unlawful.”

The learned single judge of Andhra Pradesh disagreed with the learned single judge of the Delhi High Court in the matter of “Smt Harvinder Kaur v. Harmander Singh Choudhry.” In the aforementioned ruling, the learned judge of the Delhi High Court stated that Section 9 of the said Act did not violate Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution. The learned court stated that the purpose of the restitution decision was to facilitate cohabitation between the estranged parties so that they might live together in amity in the matrimonial home. The primary goal of S.9 was to keep the marriage together.

According to the concept of cohabitation and consortium, sexual intercourse looked to the learned judge to be one of the parts that went into making up the marriage, but it was not the summum bonum. Sexual intercourse is not and cannot be enforced by the courts. Sexual connections were a key component in the notion of marriage, but they did not represent its entire substance, nor could the remaining characteristics of marital cooperation be said to be completely insignificant or of a trifling nature. The reparation remedy aims at cohabitation and consortium rather than just sexual intercourse.

The Supreme Court, after taking into account the opinions of the learned single judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court and the learned single judge of the Delhi High Court, concluded that Section 9 of the HMA did not infringe Articles 21 or 14. It took into account the technical meaning of conjugal as “of or pertaining to marriage or to husband and wife in their relations to each other,” and so agreed with Harvinder Kaur that marital consortium did not need sexual cohabitation.

Although the Court did not consider the right to privacy specifically, in overruling T. Saritha, it implied that executing Section 9 of the HMA did not constitute a violation of privacy. Furthermore, it ruled that the societal goal of protecting the sanctity of marriage was sufficient to outweigh any potential constitutional challenge. The Court pointed out that the penalty for failing to comply with an order for recovery of marital rights was attachment of property rather than specific performance.

CONSTITUTIONAL VALIDITY OF SEC 9

The constitutional validity of the provision for restitution of marital rights has been repeatedly questioned and challenged. The first time was in 1983 before the Andhra Pradesh Supreme Court in the case of T. Saritha vs T. Venkata Subbaiah, when the Supreme Court ruled that the opposition was unconstitutional.

Despite differing perspectives, the Delhi High Court ruled in the matter of Harvinder Kaur versus Harminder Singh. Finally, in the case of Saroj Rani versus Sudharshan, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Delhi High Court, upholding the legitimacy of Article 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 and overturning the verdict of T. Saritha vs T. Venkata Subbaiah.

T. Saritha v. T. Venkata Subbaiah and Saroj Rani v. Sudharshan are unquestionably two of the most important instances in the Indian spectrum of stare decisis dealing with the ‘remarriage of marital rights’ solution.

The gravity of such incidents should not be underestimated. Saritha and Saroj Rani addressed critical arguments on both sides of the restitution of marital rights debate. The primary grounds for contesting the Act’s constitutionality are violations of Articles 14 and 21 of the Indian Constitution.

Although Saritha was the first case in which the S.9 Constitution of the Law was challenged, it is worth noting what Lord Herschell observed in the case of Russell and Russell, in which he recognized the severity of such a forced settlement between the couple. This acknowledgment serves as a benchmark against which all arguments in support of the violation of the S.9 constitution can be tested.

CONCLUSION

Analyzing both the chances of this therapy is necessary to determine if it is useful to the public. A couple should strive hard to get along with each other and make their relationship work, according to Indian culture. This Section gives legal support for these cultures, but it also forces two people who do not wish to live together to live together, and a forced relationship has no future.

In the Ojaswa case, the Court has yet to rule on the validity of Section 9. It is expected that the Hon’ble Court would provide a judgment that is in the best interests of the people and also reflects Indian culture.

REFERENCE

Written by Bhoomi sharma an intern under legal vidhiya.