New Delhi: Smriti Shinde, daughter of
Union Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, on Wednesday approached the
Supreme Court seeking divorce without the consent of husband,
citing "irretrievable breakdown" of marriage.
A Bench headed by the Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan
issued notice to the Centre on her petition challenging the
provisions of the Hindu Marriage Act which requires mutual
consent for divorce proceeding.
"The law cannot compel a woman, who is emotionally and
mentally unable to cope with a marriage, to remain bound in a
wedlock to her spouse even when it is established that the
marriage is dead," she said in her plea which was placed
before the Bench by senior advocates Harish Salve and Mukul
Rohatgi.
"The compulsion of upon wife to obtain the consent of the
husband to maintain and prosecute a petition of divorce by
mutual consent is violative of the principles of gender
justice and therby of the Article 14 and 21 of the
Constitution," the petition said.
Shinde, whose plea of divorce was rejected by the apex
court earlier after her husband refused to give consent,
submitted that "the law may have been considered valid at the
time when it was enacted but it has become an anachronism and
violative of the evolved and gender sensitised interpretation
of Article 14 and 21."
PTI
