Murder conviction amounts to cruelty, warrants divorce: HC

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has made it clear that the conviction of a spouse for murder and the resultant life imprisonment amounts to "cruelty" under the matrimonial law, warranting the dissolution of marriage. The ruling came in a case where the wife had been convicted under Section 302, IPC, and sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of her children. The question before the Bench was: “Whether conviction of respondent-spouse for the offence of murder and sentence of life imprisonment amounts to cruelty?”

The Bench of Justice Sudhir Singh and Justice Harsh Bunger held that "the conviction of the respondent and sentence of life imprisonment under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code for murder has caused mental pain, agony and apprehension in the mind of the appellant-husband that it is not safe to live with the respondent and it clearly amounts to ‘cruelty’.”

The Bench was told the wife was dissatisfied with the upbringing of the children. She wished to end the relationship but viewed the children as an obstacle. As such, she killed them and was sentenced to life imprisonment vide judgment dated July 30, 2011, by the Sonepat Additional Sessions Judge.

The wife, on the other hand, contended that she had not killed the children and a false case was registered against her. An appeal against the judgment of conviction was pending.

The court noted that the long incarceration of the respondent, spanning nearly nine years, had resulted in physical deprivation of matrimonial relationship, causing further cruelty to the appellant. “...That apart, the appellant must have also borne the burden of humiliation in the society. The cruelty would continue unless the relationship is severed and, therefore, it would be in the interest of justice to dissolve the marriage by decree of divorce so as to put an end to the misery/suffering of the appellant and enable him to live his own life,” the Bench asserted.

The court also set aside the judgment and decree of a family court, which had earlier dismissed the husband’s plea for divorce.

Wife jailed for killing kids

The ruling came in a case where the wife had been convicted under Section 302, IPC, and sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of her children.