Ahmedabad court rules secret second marriage is ‘grave emotional violence’, orders husband to pay maintenance

In a significant ruling, Ahmedabad Rural Court has held that a husband contracting a second marriage without divorcing his first wife constitutes a grave form of emotional and mental domestic violence.  

This came in response to a domestic violence application filed by wife. According to the detailed case file, the wife discovered in 2018 that her husband—a corporate executive earning ₹2,00,000 per month—had secretly married another woman, in a pre-planned conspiracy while their legal marriage was still fully subsisting.

While the court noted a lack of compelling evidence regarding physical abuse, it strongly condemned the bigamous relationship. The court emphasized that the betrayal of a second marriage and the subsequent breakdown of the primary marital home inflicts severe psychological trauma on a spouse.

Consequently, the court ordered the husband to pay a consolidated monthly maintenance of ₹50,000 for wife and their six-year-old daughter, which includes ₹15,000 earmarked for separate housing. 

The court ruled that these previous payments would be strictly set off against the final arrears. Legal and physical custody of the minor daughter was granted permanently to the mother.