Pregnancy cannot erase wife’s cruelty: Delhi HC grants husband divorce

The court verdict came on a man’s petition against the family court’s March 2025 order, refusing to dissolve his marriage on the grounds of cruelty.

Wife’s pregnancy cannot be used as a basis to overlook her acts of cruelty towards her husband, the Delhi high court has ruled, while granting divorce to a man on the grounds of cruelty.

Pregnancy cannot erase wife’s cruelty: Delhi HC grants husband divorce

“The occurrence of pregnancy or temporary reconciliation cannot erase antecedent acts of cruelty, particularly when the record demonstrates that the respondent’s (wife’s) abusive conduct, threats, and denial of cohabitation persisted thereafter,” a bench of justices Anil Kshetarpal and Renu Bhatnagar said in the order delivered on November 20.

The court verdict came on a man’s petition against the family court’s March 2025 order, refusing to dissolve his marriage on the grounds of cruelty.

In the present case, the couple got married in March 2016. However, the man filed for divorce in 2021, alleging that his wife subjected him to mental cruelty. In his petition before the family court, the husband claimed that his wife openly stated that the marriage was against her wishes and that she wanted to be with another man.

He alleged that she insisted on living separately from his elderly parents, demanded a new house in her name, threw a cup of tea at him when he failed to meet her demand, and refused to cohabit with him.

However, the family court refused to grant him divorce on the grounds that the man had failed to prove cruelty and also relied on the wife’s miscarriage in early 2019 to infer a harmonious relationship between the couple.

In his plea before the high court, the husband argued that his wife’s behaviour, when viewed cumulatively, amounted to cruelty. He contended that the family court wrongly examined each incident in isolation instead of assessing its combined effect on his mental well-being and dignity. The findings regarding miscarriage in 2019 were speculative and irrelevant to the events of cruelty, which continued later, the man said.

While the woman had asserted that the man was seeking divorce to evade his own conduct of subjecting her to continuous harassment and dowry-related demands.

However, the court, in its 11-page ruling released later, overturned the family court’s order and granted divorce to the man. The bench ruled that temporary reconciliation or pregnancy cannot condone a woman’s act of cruelty, when there is evidence regarding the wife’s abusive conduct, threats, and denial of cohabitation persisting thereafter.