K’taka HC says calling hubby‘dark’ cruelty; grants divorce

BENGALURU: The High Court of Karnataka has said that insulting a man for being dark-skinned by his wife constitutes cruelty as it underlined this as a strong reason for allowing a 44-year-old man’s appeal and granting him divorce.

The evidence on record, from close scrutiny, also leads to the conclusion that the 41-year-old wife used to insult the husband on the premise that he is dark and for the same reason has moved away from the company of the husband without any cause, the court noted.

“To cover up this aspect, (she) has levelled false allegations of illicit relationships against the husband. These facts certainly will constitute cruelty,” the HC said while allowing the petition for dissolution of the marriage under Section 13(i)(a) of the Hindu Marriage Act.

The couple from Bengaluru got married in 2007 and had a girl child. In 2012, he approached a family court seeking divorce. But it was dismissed in 2017.

Hearing the appeal, the division bench of Justices Alok Aradhe and Anant Ramanath Hegde said, “…the wife has not made any attempt to join the company of the husband to come back and the evidence on record would establish that she was not interested in the marriage because of the dark complexion of the husband. By referring to these contentions, it is urged that the Family Court ought to have granted a decree for the dissolution of marriage.”