Can a husband divorce his wife for not cooking? Bombay high court answers

NEW DELHI: In a ruling on marriage, gender roles and maintenance rights, the Bombay high court has said that a wife cannot be treated as a "deemed maid" and should not be expected to compulsorily perform household chores.

The high court ordered a chartered accountant (CA) husband to pay his estranged wife with Rs 20,000 every month as a maintenance, after quashing the family court's divorce order and rejecting his claims that she was cruel because she allegedly failed to cook, clean and obey his parents, as per a report by Economic Times.

"Mere failure of wife to do chores such as cooking, cleaning does not automatically amount to cruelty as marriage is a partnership of equals and not a service contract and the wives are not deemed maids," the court added.

What was the dispute about?

The couple got married in 2002 and according to the husband the disputes started within days of the marriage. In 2002 itself, he approached the court seeking divorce on grounds of "mental cruelty". He further claimed that his wife was unable to cook, was rude and disobedient and could not do household work properly which lead to cause him mental stress. He also argued that these actions amounted to cruelty under matrimonial law.

However, the wife, denied the allegations saying that she was actually made to do all household chores, including washing utensils, cleaning and cooking, and was even forced to eat leftover food.

What did high court ruling says?

A division bench of Justice Bharati Dangre and Justice Manjusha Deshpande ruled in favour of the wife and said that "marriage is a partnership of equals and not a service contract".

The judges further added that wives are not "deemed maids" and that merely failing to perform chores such as cooking or cleaning cannot automatically amount to mental cruelty and ordinary disagreements and adjustment issues in the early days of marriage should not be exaggerated into allegations of cruelty.

The high court the set aside a 2010 family court order that had granted divorce to the husband and denied maintenance to the wife and directed the husband to pay Rs 20,000 as maintenance.

The family court had earlier made their judgement relying on an advertisement issued by the wife for "art and craft" classes and concluded that she could earn independently. The high court however disagreed and said that occasional or small-scale activity cannot be treated as proof of a stable income.

The bench further also clarified what legally qualifies as mental cruelty in divorce cases, saying that, cruelty must involve serious conduct causing humiliation, emotional suffering or making it impossible to continue the marriage.

The judgment cited examples such as abusive language, public humiliation, false allegations or restricting the personal freedom.