Sanctity of mediation process must be preserved in its entirety: Orissa HC

The judgment, authored by Justice Mishra, came while considering the woman’s application seeking directions to her husband to return the gold ornaments allegedly given to her at the time of marriage

Sanctity of the mediation process, which is essentially an extension of judicial proceedings, must be preserved in its entirety, the Orissa high court has held, while declining to direct a man to return gold ornaments to his wife following the conclusion of mediation and submission of the mediator’s report before the court.

The bench said that reopening the issue would encourage uncertainty and instability besides abuse of the process of law. (Orissa HC website)

“The sanctity of the mediation process, which is essentially an extension of judicial proceedings, needs to be maintained to its hilt. Reopening the issue would encourage uncertainty and instability besides abuse of the process of law,” Justices Manash Ranjan Pathak and Sibo Sankar Mishra held in a verdict delivered on January 21.

The judgment, authored by Justice Mishra, came while considering the woman’s application seeking directions to her husband to return the gold ornaments allegedly given to her at the time of marriage, after mediation between the parties had concluded and the mediator had submitted a report in November last year.

In the present case, the couple married in July 2010, but the woman left the matrimonial home within 40 days of the marriage and never returned. The husband subsequently filed for divorce on the grounds of cruelty, which was allowed by the court, leading to the dissolution of the marriage. The woman then challenged the decision before the high court.

After multiple hearings, the high court referred the matter to mediation, where the parties agreed to settle their dispute based on certain terms and conditions. However, 12 days later, the woman filed an application seeking additional directions.

In her application, the woman claimed that several gold ornaments given to her at the time of marriage were inadvertently not mentioned before the mediator and sought directions for their return from her husband.

The man on the other hand, opposed the application, asserting that his wife had already taken the ornaments and raised an issue regarding the maintainability of the application following the mediator’s report before the court. His counsel submitted that by filing the application, the woman was attempting to be over-clever and asserted that she had already taken the gold ornaments when she left the matrimonial home, which is why they were not mentioned in the mediation report.