The husband’s case for divorce came down to a single grievance: his wife wanted him to live as a ‘gharjamai’, at her parents’ home in Patna, and he refused because his own parents were old and ailing. That refusal, and her continued wish, he said, amounted to cruelty. The Jharkhand High Court disagreed. A wife’s desire that her husband live with her family, unaccompanied by any force or compulsion, is not cruelty; nor is her wish to visit or stay at her parental home, which the Court described as a bride’s right. With no evidence to support the allegations, the divorce was refused.
Ranchi: The Jharkhand High Court has dismissed a husband’s appeal against the refusal of divorce, holding that a wife’s mere wish that her husband live as a ‘gharjamai’, that is, a son-in-law residing at his wife’s parental home, does not, without any element of compulsion, constitute cruelty within the meaning of Section 13(1)(ia) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 [Rahul Choubey v. Poonam Pathak].
A Division Bench of Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad and Justice Sanjay Prasad, in a judgment authored by Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad, affirmed the decree of the Family Court, Hazaribagh dismissing the husband’s suit for divorce.
The husband’s case
The parties married in November 2008 at Patna according to Hindu rites, and a daughter was born of the marriage. The husband’s case was that, some time into the marriage, his wife began travelling frequently to Patna, and that her parents wanted him to leave his own parents and live with them at Patna as a gharjamai, a demand he did not accept because his parents were old and ailing and had no one else to look after them. He alleged that from February 2013 the wife stopped returning to the matrimonial home, took up a job at Patna, and remained adamant that he leave his parents and live as a gharjamai, causing him mental pressure and social stigma. On that basis he sought a decree of divorce on the ground of cruelty.
The wife did not appear before the Family Court despite service, and the suit proceeded ex parte, the husband examining himself and one other witness. The Family Court nonetheless decided the issue of cruelty against the husband and dismissed the suit, prompting the present appeal, in which an Amicus Curiae was appointed to assist the Court in the wife’s absence.
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What cruelty means, and what it does not
The Court set out the settled understanding of matrimonial cruelty, drawing on the Supreme Court’s exposition in Samar Ghosh v. Jaya Ghosh and allied decisions: that cruelty has no fixed definition, varies from case to case and person to person, and must be of such a degree that the parties cannot reasonably be expected to live together. It emphasised, equally, that the ordinary wear and tear of married life, the frictions, disagreements and incompatibilities that arise in most marriages, does not amount to cruelty.
Applying that framework, the Court addressed the two strands of the husband’s grievance. On the wife’s frequent visits to her parental home, it held that visiting one’s parental house is as good as a right of every bride, and cannot be termed cruelty:
“…visiting parental house is as good as a right to every bride and it cannot be termed cruelty.”
On the central allegation, the Court held that the practice of gharjamai is an old custom prevailing in society, that the husband had not been compelled or forced to live as one, and that a mere wish on the wife’s part that he do so could not amount to cruelty:
“Mere wish of respondent-wife that the appellant-husband should live as Gharjamai will not constitute cruelty for the purpose of Hindu Marriage Act.”
No evidence to support the allegations
Beyond the legal characterisation, the Court found the husband’s case wanting on proof. Despite the ex parte nature of the proceedings, the burden remained on the husband to establish the cruelty he alleged, and he had led no evidence to substantiate the commission of the alleged cruelty by the wife. The Family Court, the High Court held, had duly appreciated the evidence on record in concluding that cruelty was not made out, and that finding could not be said to be perverse.
Holding that the issue of cruelty as alleged could not, at any stretch of imagination, be termed cruelty for the purpose of divorce, and that the impugned judgment required no interference, the Court dismissed the appeal.
Why it matters
The judgment turns on the distinction between a preference expressed within a marriage and conduct grave enough to end it. Cruelty under Section 13(1)(ia) is a high threshold: it must be conduct that makes cohabitation unreasonable, not merely conduct a spouse finds unwelcome. A wife’s wish that the couple live with her parents, however unwelcome to a husband who wishes to remain with his own, is a matter of preference and negotiation between spouses, and does not, without coercion or something more, cross into the territory of matrimonial cruelty. The Court’s insistence that the husband was never forced to live as a gharjamai is the hinge of the reasoning.
The observation that a bride’s visits to her parental home cannot be termed cruelty is a welcome corrective to a recurring line of argument in matrimonial litigation. Frequent visits to, or a desire to stay with, one’s natal family are an ordinary feature of married life, particularly for women, and treating them as a matrimonial wrong would penalise the maintenance of family ties. By characterising such visits as a bride’s right, the Court situates the point within the everyday-friction principle: it is not every source of a spouse’s displeasure that the law will recognise as cruelty.
The evidentiary dimension is a reminder that even an uncontested matrimonial suit is not won by default. The wife’s absence and the ex parte proceedings did not relieve the husband of the burden of proving cruelty, and the Family Court was entitled, and indeed obliged, to test his pleaded case against the evidence he actually led, which the High Court found insufficient. The decision thus rests on two independent footings, that the conduct alleged did not in law amount to cruelty, and that it was not proved in fact, either of which was enough to sustain the refusal of divorce.
Case Title: Rahul Choubey v. Poonam Pathak [F.A. No. 86 of 2022]
Bench: Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad and Justice Sanjay Prasad, High Court of Jharkhand at Ranchi
Reserved: August 25, 2026 | Pronounced: September 15, 2026 | Neutral Citation: 2026:JHHC:28010-DB
Appearances: Advocate Shekhar Prasad Gupta for the appellant. Advocate Atanu Banerjee, Amicus Curiae, for the respondent.
Status: Appeal dismissed. Family Court’s refusal of divorce affirmed; a wife’s mere wish that her husband live as a gharjamai held not to constitute cruelty under the Hindu Marriage Act.
