Wife’s refusal to have physical relations with husband amounts to cruelty, is ground for divorce: Madhya Pradesh HC

The court also said that there can “never be any straight jacket formula or fixed parameters for determining mental cruelty in matrimonial matters."

The HC noted that the wife had denied consummation of marriage from the date of the wedding on July 12, 2006, until the husband left India on July 28, 2006. (Express file photo)

The Madhya Pradesh High Court has held that a wife’s refusal to consummate marriage or have physical relationship with her husband amounts to mental cruelty and is a valid ground for the husband to seek divorce.

A division bench of Justices Sheel Nagu and Vinay Saraf set aside a Bhopal family court order of November 2014 that refused to grant divorce to a man who contended that his wife was subjecting him to mental cruelty by refusing to have sexual relations with him.

“We are unable to accept the findings of the trial court on the issue of absence of consummation of marriage or physical intimacy. The trial court has wrongly held that failure on the part of the wife to consummate the marriage cannot be a ground for divorce…,” the High Court said in its order passed on January 3.

The HC noted that the wife had denied consummation of marriage from the date of the wedding on July 12, 2006, until the husband left India on July 28, 2006.

“The appellant (husband) solemnised the marriage…was hopeful to consummate the marriage but the same was denied by the respondent (wife) and certainly the said act of the respondent amounts to mental cruelty,” the order read.

The court also said that there can “never be any straight jacket formula or fixed parameters for determining mental cruelty in matrimonial matters”, and the “appropriate way to adjudicate the case would be to evaluate it on its peculiar facts”.

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