The Kerala HC while dismissing the appeal filed by the appellant Husband held that; although marital rape is not punished under Indian Law; but husband’s Licentious Disposition Disregarding Wife’s Autonomy is Marital Rape and is good ground for divorce.
The present case depicts the story of the struggle of a woman whose cry for the taking divorce was pending in the temple of justice for the last 12 years. She abandoned her right of alimony and maintenance for sake of taking divorce.
Facts-
According to the Respondent’s wife, her husband was a medical practitioner at the time of marriage. But after some time he started to do the business of Real Estate. For this, he constantly harassed her wife for money. Her father gave around 77lakhs to him. The most serious allegation levied by the wife was the worst form of sexual perversion and physical harassment. The wife said that the husband forcefully committed sexual acts with her when she was sick, bedridden even on the day of her mother’s death. She was sexually assaulted even in front of her daughter.
Court Held that:
“The body of the wife owes to him” this notion does not exist in the modern jurisprudence of law. Sex is the reflection of intimacy between husband and wife during marriage. All the evidence of this case shows that all the sexual perversion was against her wishes. And these kinds of acts amount to marital rape. Hence a good ground for divorce. Merely the law does not recognize marital rape it does not restrict the court to consider these kinds of acts as cruelty and to grant a divorce on the same basis.
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