Though matrimonial proceedings before the top court are commonplace, it is not everyday that a son recollects in open court his “traumatic childhood” at the hands of his mother and decline the Court’s request to speak to her.
A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Surya Kant was unsuccessful in persuading a 27-year-old to re-establish relationship with his mother on Monday.
The Court was hearing a matrimonial case in which the husband was seeking divorce from his wife since the last 20 years, a plea which has been opposed by his wife.
Caught between this acrimonious legal battle was a son, who stood “traumatised” at the age of seven by his mother and has been been living with his father, ever since.
When the counsel for the mother requested the Court that she be allowed to speak to her son once, the son appearing in-person, declined.
Justice DY Chandrachud, attempting a reconciliation said, “she is your mother na, speak to her.”
The son then proceeded to recount the ill treatment he suffered at the hands of his mother.
“It brings back traumatic memories. I used to be locked in washroom and beaten up. I am not a parent but this not way to raise a child. I used to beaten so much. I was only seven years old. My father never raised a finger on me,” said the son.
My father never raised a finger on me.
Son to Supreme Court
The opposition counsel alleged that the son was only “narrating a scripted tale.”
To this, the top court observed that a 27-year-old man cannot narrate a scripted tale in this regard.
Later the bench was informed by Advocate Archana Pathak Dave appearing for the husband that the wife never moved court to seek custody of the child.
The judges soon departed to the open lounge in Supreme Court to have a dialogue with the parents and the son.
Bar & Bench has learnt that the judges told the son to act as a bridge between the now aged parents, to which the son stated that he does not wish to reconnect with his mother.
Though the mother said that she does not want to live with the stigma of being a divorcee, the husband said that he only wants a quietus to the two-decade-old matrimonial dispute.
The bench will again meet the parents and the son after a month to resume dialogue between the parties.
The couple had tied the knot in 1988 and in 2002 the husband sought divorce on the ground of cruelty and started living separately. After being unsuccessful both before the trial court and the High Court, the husband is now before the Supreme Court seeking divorce under Article 142.
The Court had issued notice in the case in 2019 and even attempted mediation, though it failed.
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