Accusations of mental illness against the husband’s mother by the wife do not constitute ‘cruelty,’ as ruled by the Calcutta High Court, dismissing the plea for the dissolution of the marriage

Case: Gopal Ranjan Bandopadhyay @ Gopal Ranjan Banerjee v Smt. Manidipa Banerjee (Talukdar)

Coram: Justice Harish Tandon and Justice Madhuresh Prasad

Case No.: FA 9 of 2016

Court Observation: The issue of mental illness has not been established or proved with any material in the trial. Such allegation, per se cannot be viewed to constitute an act of mental cruelty. There is also nothing on record to show that the petitioner at any time prior to filing of the suit in question had objected to the respondent residing with her parents, or made any efforts to bring her back to the matrimonial home.

We take judicial notice of the fact that family members of a large number of people suffering with mental illness are averse to accept the existence of mental illness, nurturing a baseless fear of social stigma. Such misplaced common notions cannot be accepted by the Court to hold that an allegation of mental illness of the petitioner/ appellant’s mother per se would constitute an act of mental cruelty.

It is also not clear as to why the petitioner waited from 2003 to 2009. If the respondent would have deserted the petitioner in 2003, it is quite unnatural conduct that the petitioner would have waited six years or more after desertion, before approaching the Court for dissolution of marriage. We, therefore, have no hesitation in holding that desertion as contemplated under the Act, has also not been established by the petitioner.

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Keywords

Accusations of mental illness, Calcutta High Court