HC reunites grandmother and grandchild, upholds visitation rights

The Bombay High Court granted grandparents visitation rights, allowing a grandmother to see her grandchild after concerns arose about the child's safety.

Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Wednesday affirmed the visitation rights of grandparents to their grandchildren after reuniting a child with her grandmother who expressed apprehensions that the child’s father might sell her.

HC reunites grandmother and grandchild, upholds visitation rights

The grandmother, a resident of Malad, alleged that the father had run away with the child, intending to sell her, after his wife died of cancer earlier this year. She approached the High Court and filed a petition for her grandchild to be produced before the high court.

Responding to the urgent nature of the matter, a bench of Justice Bharti Dangre and Justice Manjusha Deshpande directed the Dindoshi police station in October to trace the father’s whereabouts, as he was last known to have resided in its jurisdiction, and to produce the child before the court.

In two days, the Dindoshi police station produced the child, who was accompanied by the father, before the court. The court observed the maternal grandmother was not entitled to the child’s custody as the biological father/guardian is there to take care of her. However, balancing the interests of the two parties, the court held that the grandmother shall be entitled to have access to the child on at least two occasions in the month.

The court said that the bond between the child and the grandmother does not have to be disconnected. With her own child no longer alive, the grandmother would like to enjoy some happy moments in the grandchild’s company, the court said, while passing an order directing the father to allow visitation rights of the grandmother. The court also assured that the child is safe with the father.