Irretrievable breakdown is not an independent statutory ground for divorce under the Hindu Marriage Act.

The parties married on 23 April 2014 and had a daughter.

The wife petitioned for divorce, alleging cruelty, including physical abuse, pressure to borrow money for the husband, and a forced abortion. The husband denied the allegations and maintained that the wife had left the matrimonial home and refused to return.

The Family Court dismissed the petition; the wife appealed under Section 19(1) of the Family Courts Act.

1. Whether the wife established cruelty by the husband as a ground for divorce under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.

2. Whether the parties’ prolonged separation and alleged irretrievable breakdown of the marriage independently warranted a divorce decree.

Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 provides the statutory grounds for divorce; irretrievable breakdown of marriage is not, by itself, an independent ground under that provision.

Section 20(1) of the Act requires a petition to state distinctly the facts on which the claim for relief is founded.

In Bondar Singh v. Nehal Singh, (2003) 4 SCC 161, the Supreme Court held that evidence ordinarily cannot establish a material fact absent necessary pleadings.

Sarwan Singh v. State of Punjab, AIR 2002 SC 3652, was cited for the principle that evidence on a point may be accepted where the opposing party declines to challenge it in cross-examination.

Balu Sudam Khalde v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 2023 SC 1736, was cited for the proposition that an incriminating suggestion made in cross-examination may bind the party whose counsel made it.

The Court held that the wife’s dowry allegation was absent from the petition and was not supported by the evidence of either the wife or her mother; the alleged demand for her salary was raised only through suggestions in cross-examination and lacked a foundation in the pleadings.

It treated the allegation of forced abortion as unsupported by medical or other documentary evidence and found no documentary support for the alleged police complaint.

The oral accounts of the parties on the remaining allegations were in conflict, while the husband’s account of how the wife left the matrimonial home had not been specifically challenged in cross-examination.

On the evidence as a whole, the Court concluded that cruelty was not proved; separation and alleged irretrievable breakdown could not independently supply a statutory ground for divorce.

It held that she had not established cruelty or another statutory ground for divorce, and that prolonged separation or irretrievable breakdown alone did not entitle her to a decree.

The appeal was dismissed, and the Family Court’s judgment and decree were left undisturbed.