The Delhi High Court ruled that questioning a husband’s legitimacy and making derogatory remarks against his mother amount to mental cruelty, upholding a divorce decree granted to the husband on grounds of persistent abusive and degrading conduct.
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NEW DELHI: In a ruling reaffirming the contours of mental cruelty as a ground for divorce, the Delhi High Court has held that questioning a husband’s legitimacy and making reprehensible allegations against his mother constitute severe mental cruelty warranting dissolution of marriage.
The judgment, delivered on October 17, 2025, by a division bench of Justices Anil Kshetarpal and Harish Vaidyanathan Shankar, upheld a family court’s decree of divorce in favour of the husband, observing that the wife’s conduct caused him grave mental agony and humiliation.
Background of the Case
The case involved a couple, the wife, a Group A officer of the Indian Railway Traffic Service (IRTS), and the husband, an advocate by profession. The two married in January 2010, but their relationship deteriorated quickly, and they separated in March 2011, barely a year later.
It was the second marriage for both parties. In 2023, a family court granted a divorce decree in favour of the husband on the ground of cruelty under Section 13(1)(ia) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.
Challenging this, the wife appealed before the Delhi High Court, contending that the family court had ignored the cruelty allegedly inflicted upon her by her husband, including caste-based remarks, coercion to perform domestic chores, and multiple false litigations.
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Court’s Findings
The High Court rejected the wife’s contentions and observed that her proven acts of cruelty stood independently, regardless of her claims of mistreatment.
“Two wrongs do not make a right. The appellant’s proven acts of cruelty, including the use of abusive language, physical violence, and social isolation, stand on their own footing and are severe enough to warrant the dissolution of the marriage,”
the bench observed.
The judges emphasized that verbal abuse and defamatory communications can amount to mental cruelty if they are persistent, deliberate, and injurious to a spouse’s dignity and reputation.
“Words and communications of the sort proved in this case are not innocuous. The law recognises that mental cruelty may be visited by persistent and deliberate verbal abuse and conduct that degrades a spouse and injures reputation and self-respect,”
the court noted.
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The High Court relied on evidence showing that the wife had sent “vile, derogatory, and scandalous” messages to the husband. These included calling him “bastard” and “son of a bitch”, and making highly objectionable remarks about his mother, suggesting she should “earn through prostitution.”
“Specific messages… which included terms such as ‘bastard’, ‘son of a bitch’, and suggestions that his mother should ‘earn through prostitution’, are by themselves sufficient to constitute mental cruelty of the gravest kind,”
the bench said.
The court observed that these imputations of illegitimacy and obscene insults went far beyond ordinary marital discord and inflicted deep mental trauma.
Reiterating the principles established in past judgments, the High Court clarified that mental cruelty need not be confined to physical acts. It can also be established through verbal abuse, false allegations, and defamatory communications that cause emotional suffering and humiliation.
The judgment aligns with precedents such as Samar Ghosh v. Jaya Ghosh (2007), where the Supreme Court laid down that conduct which causes “mental pain, agony or suffering” to a degree that makes it impossible for the spouses to live together amounts to cruelty.
The Delhi High Court concluded that the wife’s actions constituted grave mental cruelty and fully justified the husband’s plea for divorce.
“The text messages contained imputations of illegitimacy, filthy epithets directed at the husband’s mother, and other degrading expressions, a pattern of conduct which, cumulatively, the family court was entitled to regard as causing grave mental agony to him,”
the bench stated.
Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed, and the divorce decree granted by the family court was upheld.
Case Title:
X v. Y
MAT.APP.(F.C.) 2/2024
READ JUDGMENT