Making marriage laws more women-friendly, the Union Cabinet on Friday approved a Bill seeking to give a woman a share in her husband's property after divorce.
The quantum of share, however, will be decided by the courts on a case-by-case basis.
While a wife can oppose a husband's plea for divorce under the new “irretrievable breakdown of marriage” clause, the husband will have no such rights to oppose if the wife moves the court on the same grounds, it says.
Apart from giving women the right to their husband's property, the Marriage Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2010, also aims at giving rights to adopted children on a par with biological off-springs in case the parents go for a divorce.
The Bill was introduced in the Rajya Sabha two years ago and then referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Law and Justice and Personnel.
Waiting period
Supporting the Bill, which sought to make “irretrievable breakdown of marriage” a new ground for grant of divorce, the Standing Committee in March last year opposed doing away with the prevailing waiting period before moving a joint motion for annulling marriage.
Partially accepting the recommendation, the government has now left the cooling off period to be decided by courts.
According to the re-drafted Bill passed by the Cabinet, adopted children will have rights on a par with biological offspring of a couple in case the parents go in for a divorce.
The government has also accepted the recommendation of the parliamentary committee that women have a share in the property of her husband in case of a divorce, but the quantum of share will be decided by courts on a case-by-case basis.
Keywords: marriage laws, husband's property, divorce
Settle the matter in 3 months and live and let live be the principle. Indian law doesnt respect indians.Ministers make law as per their family problem. Every family problem is different. In the name of
children, etc , the high profile lady can misuse the law. Today the ladies are much qualified at the level of directors,ceo etc, then why cant they fight on merit basis. There are genuine cases also. Analyse the case.
a dangerous move that may even harm the existence of indian family system . share of husbands property without husband!!!!ridiculous!1
Reducing the cooling period is a welcome move. This is because if a couple decides its over, even a long cooling period will not help things get better.
However, share in the husband's property will only encourage more divorces, especially if the girls family wants to make money out of a divorce situation. This is from my personal experience
We should protect the females. At the same time, we should see the
future problems of this law. Absolutely, It will give unwanted
courageous to women and the women will go for divorce even small
misunderstandings between husband and wife since she will get her
husband's property. Finally it will destroy the family harmony.
We had seen gross misuse of "Dowry" act. Now,another window is being opened to exploit marriage.Who will stop greedy partners to marry persons with wealth for a short period in order to claim share in spouse's property?.Very soon, we may see rush of cases against husbands quoting “irretrievable breakdown of marriage”.
The bottom line, guys and girls(especially if you are quite rich) is if you don't want to ever think of the spouse walking away with a lions share of your hard earned money for reasons such as a divorce, then don't marry. The option to co-exist as partners is always open. Also make sure that you do not have children. Else you could have the children fighting it out in the courts with one or both the parents. These rules are never going to affect the millions in India who have just nothing for the wife to take away when she leaves after a divorce. Most of the times, the wife is just happy to leave the malfunctioning relationship. Property that she can have is the last thing on her mind until the property in question is worth crores or rupees.
It looks like the government is promoting westernisation by amending the marriage laws. Now, its easy for the couples to get divorced which hitherto was difficult and there were many cases in the past werecouples seeking divorces got together again because of the stringency. The law is giving an upper hand to the woman community and that of course is appreciable.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Law, Justice and Personnel had rightly opposed to rescind the established waiting period of 6 months before moving a joint motion for disband a marriage. Now the Cabinet had blemished this rule by empowering courts to decide for a reduced cooling period which may prompt young couples to break-up matrimony on flimsy reasons against our treasured Indian culture and traditions. It is against natural law when men as husbands have no equal right while women can oppose spouses’ plea for ‘irretrievable break-down of marriage’. There will be a spurt in divorce petitions initiated by women once this becomes the rule.
Similarly while women will get a share in husbands’ properties upon getting divorce, the same rule does not correspondingly apply for men as well. This prejudice against men should be removed, let the quantum of share to spouse be at the discretion of the court on a case to case basis.
In the name of women-friendly bill we are again moving towards gender inequality. Gender does not mean by female only. Male also comes within the meaning of gender equality. In over enthusiasm we forget the basic principle of law i.e. equality before law. We support that wife must get share in husband's properties and at the same time it is expected that husband should get share in wife's properties. If wife gets right to oppose divorce petition of husband, the husband should also be given right on the same footing. If we talk of equality, equality should govern both husband and wife.
Only time will decide whether it will increase the divorce cases for getting the share of property or it may lead to same trend followed in West , where getting married is costly affair than having child without marriage.
With Domestic violence Act teething the ladies with right to property in
that of the husband, it is high time when women are employed and acquire
property, the husband should also share the wife's property in case of
divorce, as some times the husband invests his monies in acquiring the
property in the name of wife for obvious reasons, including domestic
harmony
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