The Court added that if despite objection, the husband or wife continues with such activity, then it certainly will cause mental cruelty.
The Madhya Pradesh High Court dismissed a woman’s appeal challenging the dissolution of her marriage, ruling that her explicit conversations with other men constituted mental cruelty toward her husband, justifying divorce on the grounds of cruelty.
Justice Vivek Rusia and Justice Gajendra Singh, presiding over the Indore bench of the High Court, observed: “No husband would tolerate that his wife is in conversation through mobile by way of these type of vulgar chatting. After marriage husband and wife both have freedom to have a conversation by way of mobile, chatting and other means with friends but the level of conversation should be decent and dignified , specially when it is with an opposite gender, which may not objectionable to the life partner. If despite objection husband or wife continues with such activity of activities , then certainly it causes mental cruelty.”
The couple married in December 2018 following Hindu customs. The husband (respondent), a bank manager with partial hearing impairment, alleged that his wife (appellant) mistreated his mother, often addressing her as the “mother of a deaf man” (बहरे क मां). He also claimed that she left the matrimonial home within 1.5 months of marriage and refused to return.
Furthermore, the husband accused his wife of engaging in explicit WhatsApp conversations with former lovers, discussing past physical relationships. He alleged that she had also threatened to falsely implicate him in legal cases. To substantiate his claims, he presented WhatsApp chat transcripts, a police complaint, and a written statement from the wife’s father, who admitted that his daughter’s actions had brought shame to the family.
After evaluating the evidence, the family court ruled in the husband’s favor and granted him a divorce on grounds of mental cruelty on June 24, 2023.
In response, the wife denied all allegations, arguing that her husband had violated her right to privacy by accessing her personal chats. She further accused him of hacking her phone and fabricating evidence.
She further accused her husband of subjecting her to domestic violence and demanding a dowry of ₹25 lakh.
However, during cross-examination, she admitted to having submitted an apology at Neelganga police station on September 2, 2020. Her father, a senior advocate, did not refute his earlier statement acknowledging her frequent conversations with male friends.
The High Court upheld the family court’s ruling, emphasising that “It is not expected from a wife or husband to indulge into in to the undignified or indecent conversation by way of chatting with a male or female friends as the case may be that too after marriage.”
The court also ruled that persisting in such behavior despite objections constitutes mental cruelty, justifying the dissolution of marriage “The respondent has certainly make out the case by way of evidence that the appellant committed mentally cruelty upon him,” the court stated.
In conclusion, the court ruled that the appeal was subject to dismissal, stating that “the appellant has failed to point out any perversity in the findings recorded by the family court.”
The court affirmed the family court’s ruling, rejecting the wife’s appeal and upholding the divorce decree.
