The Punjab and Haryana High Court recently ruled that a wife calling her husband Hijda (transgender) amounts to mental cruelty.

The Division Bench of Justice Sudhir Singh and Justice Jasjit Singh Bedi was hearing a wife’s appeal against the divorce decree granted in favour of her husband by a family court on July 12.

The husband’s mother had deposed that his wife would call her son a Hijda.  

“If the findings recorded by the learned Family Court, are examined in the light of the … judgments of the Hon’ble Supreme Court, it comes out that the acts and conduct of the appellant-wife amounts to cruelty. Firstly, terming the respondent-husband as Hijda (transgender) and calling his mother to have given birth to a transgender, is an act of cruelty,” the Bench said.

The couple had married in December 2017. The husband in the divorce plea had alleged that his wife used to wake up late at night and also ask his ailing mother to send her lunch on the first floor from the ground floor. 

It was also alleged that she was addicted to porn and mobile games. In particular, the husband alleged that the wife used to ask him to record the duration of sex and would also state that it “must go on for at least 10-15 minutes at a time and that it must be at least thrice per night”. 

She used to taunt him for not “being physically fit to compete with her” and had disclosed that she wanted to marry someone else, the plea said.

In response, the wife had denied the allegations and instead said she was thrown out of her matrimonial home by the husband.

She also alleged that her in-laws had administered her intoxicated medicines due to which she fell unconscious and “during that state, they put a Tabiz from a Tantrik on her neck besides administering her intoxicated water so that they could have control over her”.

In appeal, the wife said the testimonies of her husband and his mother had wrongly been relied upon by the family court to return a finding of cruelty. It was also submitted that her allegation of administration of intoxicants had wrongly been discarded by terming them self-serving.

However, the High Court opined that this allegation had not been substantiated as in respect of the cruelty against her, the wife had not examined her parents or any close relatives.

Further, the Court noted that the wife’s petition alleging domestic violence by the husband was dismissed by the trial court.

There is nothing on record to show that the finding has been set aside by the higher court in appeal or revision, it added.

“Considering the overall acts and conduct of the appellant-wife and further considering that the parties had been living separately for the last six years, it was rightly found by the learned family court that the marriage between the parties has ruptured beyond repair and it has become a dead wood,” the Court further said.

The Court also said the parties have been living separately for the past six years and there is no possibility of reunion.

Accordingly, it upheld the family court's decision to dissolve the marriage and dismissed the wife’s appeal.

Advocates Vaibhav Jain, Akshat Dalal and Anil K Sokal represented the wife.