The Bombay High Court approved the petitioner’s motion to transfer the domestic violence case from the Magistrate’s Court to the Family Court, where a divorce petition has been filed. The court stated that the transfer would not result in undue hardship for the respondent, as both courts are located within the same city.
Justice Amit Borkar determined that the transfer of the case is necessary to avoid potential inconsistencies in rulings and to minimize the workload of a single court.
“There is the possibility of conflicting verdicts by two courts, and transfer will reduce the burden of one Court resulting in saving of judicial time; and moreover, the transfer of proceedings will not cause inconvenience to the wife as she will not have to travel outside Pune, therefore, for the aforesaid reasons, in my opinion, both miscellaneous civil applications deserve to be allowed”.
The husband asserted that the key evidence in both the divorce case and the case against his wife under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (DV Act) is identical. He argued that conducting the two proceedings separately would negatively impact the effectiveness of cross-examination.
The wife’s advocate, Abhinav Chandrachud, cited the case of Abhijeet Prabhakar Jail v. Manisha Abhijeet Jail and argued that the transfer would strip the wife of her statutory right to appeal under section 29 of the DV Act and her right to a prompt resolution of the case.
The counsel argued that subsequent decisions made by the High Court failed to consider Abhijeet Prabhakar Jail, and therefore, the matter should be referred to a higher bench.
The husband’s advocates, Abhijeet Sarwate and Ajinkya Udane, submitted that the court has consistently held that proceedings under the DV Act can be transferred to the Family Court.
Justice Borkar noted that it has consistently been established that the proceedings under the DV Act can be transferred to the Family Court as it has the ability to efficiently handle and grant the relief sought. The Family Court has the authority to address the reliefs specified in sections 18 to 22 of the DV Act, the court cited, referencing the precedent.
In the case of Abhijeet Prabhakar Jail, the court denied the husband’s transfer request on four grounds, two of which were that the transfer would undermine the right to a prompt resolution under the DV Act and would remove the wife’s statutory right to appeal.
The court stated that only the ratio decidendi of a case constitutes a binding precedent. The court utilized the inversion test to determine the ratio in the Abhijeet Prabhakar Jail case.
The court stated that even if the argument that transferring proceedings would impede the right to a prompt resolution is disregarded, the single judge would have still reached the same decision based on the other reasons, thus, this argument does not form the ratio of the judgment.
The court referred to Sandip Mrinmoy Chakrabarty v. Reshita Sandip Chakrabarty, in which the division bench concluded that a family court appeal challenging a common order arising from proceedings under both the DV Act and the Family Courts Act would be admissible.
Therefore, the court held that the decision in Abhijeet Prabhakar Jail is not applicable in light of the division bench ruling in Sandip Mrinmoy Chakrabarty.
As it has consistently been the view of various single judges of the court that proceedings under the DV Act can be transferred to the Family Court, the court stated that it was unnecessary to refer the matter to a higher bench.
The consistent view held by various Single Judges of this Court that proceedings under the DV Act can be transferred to the Family Court compels me to conclude that it is unnecessary to refer the matter to a larger bench, as the legal position on the matter appears to have been established by the aforementioned decisions,” the court stated.
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