The Madhya Pradesh High Court has determined that ending a pregnancy without the husband's consent is considered cruelty under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act (HMA), 1955.

This ruling supports the dissolution of marriage between the appellant (wife) and the respondent (husband) based on the grounds of cruelty and desertion.

Presided over by Justice Vivek Rusia and Justice Binod Kumar Dwivedi, the court delved deeply into the concept of 'cruelty,' highlighting that it includes both physical and mental harm. They ruled that terminating a pregnancy without the husband's consent qualifies as cruelty within this definition. Nonetheless, the court noted that there is no universal standard for such cases and that whether the termination of pregnancy constitutes 'cruelty' depends on the specific facts and circumstances of each case.

In a case adjudicated by the Madhya Pradesh High Court, the court addressed a divorce petition filed under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, on grounds of cruelty and desertion. The husband, who married the appellant in 2017, sought divorce, alleging that the marriage deteriorated due to the appellant's mistreatment and threats, including falsely accusing him and his family of dowry demands. Additionally, the appellant had terminated a pregnancy without his consent and subsequently left their home to live with her parents, returning briefly but leaving again despite the husband's objections.

On November 12, 2017, the appellant filed a false FIR against the respondent and his family, alleging cruelty and dowry demands. However, the trial court acquitted them of these charges on November 5, 2019. Claiming that the appellant had abandoned him for over three years, the respondent's petition led to an ex parte divorce proceeding on July 14, 2022, after the appellant failed to appear despite receiving a summons. The family court granted the divorce on September 3, 2022, citing cruelty and desertion.

The appellant challenged this order in the High Court, arguing that she was not given a fair opportunity to participate and that the family court's judgment was flawed. Her counsel contended that the allegations against her were baseless and that the ex parte proceedings were conducted prematurely.

The High Court reviewed Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, and considered precedents such as ‘N.G. Dastane v. S. Dastane (1975)’, which emphasized that courts must consider the specific circumstances of the parties rather than abstract ideals, and ‘Shobha Rani v. Madhukar Reddi (1988)’, which noted that cruelty can be mental or physical and must be assessed based on its impact and whether it creates a reasonable apprehension of harm.

“The question of mental cruelty has to be considered in the light of the norms of marital ties of the particular society to which the parties belong, their social values, status, environment in which they live. Cruelty, as noted above, includes mental cruelty, which falls within the purview of a matrimonial wrong. Cruelty need not be physical. If from the conduct of the spouse same is established and/or an inference can be legitimately drawn that the treatment of the spouse is such that it causes an apprehension in the mind of the other spouse, about his or her mental welfare then this conduct amounts to cruelty. In a delicate human relationship like matrimony, one has to see the probabilities of the case,” the court noted.

Conclusively, the court held that, in the present case, the family court had not committed any legal or factual error in its judgment. “The findings recorded by the learned Court below are impregnable and infallible,” the court stated.

“It is only the wife, who has ruined her family life by her own misdeeds,” the court further remarked, finding that the evidence presented was credible, and the grounds for divorce were convincingly established.