Live In Relations Can't Provide Stability; Difficult For A Woman To Find Husband After Coming Out Of Such Relation: Allahabad HC

Granting bail to a man accused of raping his married live-in partner, the Allahabad High Court on Tuesday observed that it is very difficult for a woman to find a male partner for marriage after they come out of a live-in relationship.

Noting that such relations do not have social action of Indian people, which mainly consists of the middle class, the bench observed that such middle class doesn't look upon such separated females as normal.

"They do(nt) consider a female coming out of such a relationship as a normal being. Exception apart, no family willingly accepts such a female as their family member. There is no dearth of cases coming to the courts where the female partner of an erstwhile relationship commits suicide out of disgust caused by socially ill behaviour," the Court remarked.

"From social ostracisation to indecent public comments become part of her post-live-in relationship ordeal," the Court said as it added that while it is not difficult to find another female live-in-partner or wife for the male counterpart of a relationship, it is very difficult for a female partner to find a male partner for marriage as the social middle-class norms, irrespective of the religious of the female partner, militate against her efforts to regain her social status.

In its order, the Bench of Justice Siddharth also underscored that morality cannot be ignored in a country like ours as our country mostly consists of the middle class.

Opining that the stability, social, political and economic of a nation depends on the size of the middle class only, the Court further pointed out that most of the problems being faced by Pakistan are mainly due to the lack of a middle class.

"The absence of middle class and middle-class morality in Pakistan is ample testimony of the social, political, religious, ethical and other types of unrest. Most of the problems being faced by Pakistan are mainly due to the lack of a middle class. The middle class has a vested interest in maintaining social, political, religious and other orders of society since it has optimum means of fair survival and it does not want that it should be deprived of the same. Pakistan consists mostly of the highest class and poor class. The middle class is not much in that country," the bench remarked.

The bench also said that the highest class and the lowest class have nothing to do with morality as it "dies in riches and chokes in poverty". The Court added that for the highest class, there is no morality and the lowest class cannot afford to follow the same due to compulsions of poverty.

The Court made these observations in the case while granting bail to one Adnan (Accused) who was arrested on April 18, 2023, on the charges of resiling from his promise to marry his live-in partner.

Essentially, it was the case of the victim, a 19-year-old girl (as per the ossification test report), whom the applicant befriended, they had a live-in relationship for one year and they entered into a physical relationship with mutual consent and when she got pregnant, he refused to fulfil his promise to marry her and hence, she alleged that the boy had committed rape on the false promise of marriage.

After hearing the rival contentions, the Court found that this was another case where "after enjoying the live-in relationship" the young couple had parted ways. The Court noted that the victim girl, like in the majority of the cases, lodged the FIR in a vain bid to enter into a secure relationship of marriage with the applicant and come within the ambit of the socially accepted norms and relationship of marriage.

While granting bail to the accused, the Court stressed that a systematic design is working to destroy the institution of marriage in India and that films and TV serials are contributing to the same.

More details of the case here: 'Changing Partner In Every Season No Hallmark Of Stable Society, Systematic Design Working To Destroy Marriage Institution In India': Allahabad HC

Also read: Genuine Cases Of Sexual Offences Now An Exception; Women Lodging False FIRs After Long Physical Relation With Accused: Allahabad HC