NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday said mental cruelty is a major ground for grant of decree of divorce and it cannot be measured with arithmetical exactitude as it varies from society to society and person to person.
Granting divorce to a Banglore-based doctor couple on ground of mental cruelty, a Bench of Justice S J Mukhopadhaya and Justice Dipak Misra said social status of a person, alleging cruelty, is also a key factor in measuring it and its effects.
“Mental cruelty and its effect cannot be stated with arithmetical exactitude. It varies from individual to individual, from society to society and also depends on the status of the persons. What would be a mental cruelty in the life of two individuals belonging to particular strata of the society may not amount to mental cruelty in respect of another couple belonging to a different stratum of society,” the Bench said. “We are disposed to think that the husband has reasons to feel that he has been humiliated, for allegations have been made against him which are not correct.
“His relatives have been dragged into the matrimonial controversy, the assertions in the written statement depict him as if he had tacitly conceded to have harboured notions of gender insensitivity or some kind of male chauvinism, his parents and he are ignored in the naming ceremony of the son, and he comes to learn from others that his wife had gone to Gulbarga to prosecute her studies,” the court said.