‘Parents should not influence marriage’

Justice MS Ramesh, while quashing the proceedings on the file of All Women Police Station, Vepery, said, “No doubt, as the elders of the family, they deserve due respect and love from the couple as well. But when in comes to a stage of frustration were their involvement affects the matrimonial life of the young couple itself, it would be appropriate that they should restrict their interference and encourage the young couple to sort out their indifferences themselves.” 

“In case, they are in a position to take a decision on any indifferences which can be acceptable to both the young couple, the same could be encouraged,” the judge added. As per the case, the petitioner LJ Venkatesh got married to Swapna Sridharan, on June 29, 2015. There was an estranged relationship between the couple and on June 25, 2016, the petitioner had moved the family court seeking for dissolution of his marriage. 

Subsequently, on June 30, 2016, the wife filed a complaint before the Social Welfare Officer and Domestic Violence Act, against her husband and his parents. On November 12, 2016 a police complaint was also registered at the All Women Police Station in Vepery. The said FIR is under challenge in the present petition. The petitioners counsel submitted that the present complaints were filed as a counter to the divorce proceedings. 

Similarly, his wife had also initiated domestic violence case in retaliation. Since the offences have not been made out and that the complaint has been falsely made, the FIR is liable to be quashed. The counsel appearing for the respondent mother-in-law submitted that the petitioners had treated her daughter with utmost cruelty and had manually assaulted the infant child by banging its head on an iron gate and are liable to be punished. 

However, the judge on holding that admittedly the couple had lived together for about four months, said, “Most of the allegations in the complaint pertains to certain averments that took place prior to the marriage. The incidents after the marriage are very vague in nature and does not carry any details of the alleged cruelty.”