When Mrs Pandey left her matrimonial house on July 17, 2017, she sent a legal notice to her husband stating that the marriage had broken down. Thereafter, her husband Mr Pandey filed a court petition for divorce. While the divorce petition was in court, Mrs Pandey caught her husband living with another woman. He even had two children with her. Mrs Pandey discovered this when Mr Pandey was outside the school dropping the children.
When the court heard Mrs Pandey’s statement, the divorce case took a sharp u turn. The Family Court applied Section 23(1)(a) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, and stated that Mr Pandey had approached the court with unclean hands and taken advantage of his own wrongdoing. Thus the Family Court did not grant divorce to Mr Pandey and instead imposed Rs 2 lakh cost on him as due to his actions Mrs Pandey had to travel from Banaras to Delhi regularly to attend the court hearings.
The Family Court observed that after being caught, Mr Pandey himself admitted in court that he was in a live-in relationship with another woman. Accordingly, the Family Court held that since his own conduct was wrong and amounted to cruelty to the wife, by filing divorce petition against the wife, he was taking advantage of his own wrong, and hence, his divorce petition deserved to be dismissed.
The Family court said that Mr Pandey’s action showed his own adulterous conduct and it was not him who was entitled to divorce; rather, Mrs Pandey (the first wife) was entitled to divorce from him for causing grave mental cruelty to his wife.
On September 23, 2026, the Delhi High Court confirmed the Family Court’s direction and dismissed Mr Pandey’s case. So Mr Pandey did not get divorce and had to pay Rs 2 lakh in costs.
Why did the husband lose the case?
Advocate Amitraj Kaushal practicing in the Supreme Court of India said to ET Wealth Online: The husband lost the divorce appeal because he failed to establish legally recognised grounds for divorce, particularly cruelty or desertion, under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955. The Delhi High Court found that the matrimonial disputes and disagreements were insufficient to constitute legally established cruelty warranting dissolution of the marriage.
Kaushal says that the Delhi Court also considered the parties’ continued interactions, which were relevant to the husband’s allegations of cruelty and the question of condonation. Consequently, the Delhi High Court upheld the Family Court’s decision denying divorce.
Delhi High Court discussion
The Delhi High Court said that the facts of this case demonstrate that the husband had already made up his mind to leave her and thus filed a divorce petition on the ground of cruelty.
The Delhi High Court observed that though he alleged desertion by the wife as the ground for the divorce notice, he had taken advantage of the fact that she resided in Mirzapur, U.P. and therefore, faced difficulties in prosecuting the case, a fact that was noted by the Trial Court.
The Delhi High Court observed: “The fact that the Appellant (husband) is living with another lady and has children from her is not denied, rather it has been accepted.”
Case law cited by the Delhi High Court: Supreme Court case of Hirachand Srinivas Mangaonkar v. Sunanda, (2001) 4 SCC 125
The Delhi High Court said that the family court relied on Section 23(1)(a) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, and rightly denied divorce.
The Delhi High Court said that they did not find any reason to issue notice in the present appeal and force her to once again come to Delhi to contest the case, putting her to further agony and making her spend money to prosecute the case.
The Delhi High Court upheld the family court’s denial of divorce and said that if she wants, she can file an application seeking release of Rs 2 lakh deposited by him with the Registrar General of Delhi High Court.