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Chhattisgarh High Court upheld divorce, citing wife’s repeated “paaltu chuha” insults and pressure to leave parents as cruelty.
The court directed husband to pay ₹5 lakh as permanent alimony to his former wife.
The Chhattisgarh High Court upheld a family court order dissolving a marriage, ruling that a wife repeatedly calling her husband a “paaltu chuha” (pet rat) for obeying his parents amounted to cruelty. In a judgment delivered on September 3, a division bench of Justices Rajani Dubey and Amitendra Kishore Prasad dismissed the wife’s appeal against a 2019 family court decision, concluding that evidence substantiated the husband’s claims of cruelty and desertion.
The husband alleged that his wife frequently provoked him against his parents and pressured him to live separately. When he refused, she became aggressive, attempted self-harm during pregnancy and derided him as a “pet rat” of his parents.
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He presented text messages and testimonies from relatives showing that his wife disrespected elders and refused to adjust to the joint family setting. In court, the wife admitted sending a message telling her husband, “Leave your parents and stay with me.”
The bench noted that in the Indian social context, coercing a spouse to abandon their parents constitutes mental cruelty. It also held that the wife’s prolonged residence at her parental home- aside from a brief return in 2011- met the legal threshold for desertion.
Rejecting her plea for restitution of conjugal rights, the court said her conduct undermined her case. While affirming the divorce, the High Court directed the husband to pay ₹5 lakh as permanent alimony to his former wife.
Chhattisgarh, India, India
September 25, 2025, 18:07 IST
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