The Karnataka High Court granted a divorce to a 44-year-old woman, observing that her husband treated her “as a cash cow” and had a materialistic attitude towards her, The Times of India reported on Wednesday.
The court said that the husband did not have any emotional ties with his wife and that such behaviour constituted sufficient grounds to be considered mental cruelty.
On June 22, a family court in the Bengaluru Rural district dismissed the woman’s application seeking dissolution of her marriage. She then approached the High Court to challenge the judgement.
The woman said in her petition that she moved to the United Arab Emirates in 2008 to work in a bank after the couple faced financial difficulties, The Indian Express reported. She added that she paid the debts of her husband’s family with her earnings.
The woman also told the court that she had invested in her husband’s business in the United Arab Emirates, but he abandoned it within a short time.
A bench headed by Justice Alok Aradhe of the High Court said that a statement of accounts presented by the woman said that transactions amounting to Rs 60 lakh were made in favour of the husband by the woman.
“The attitude of the respondent [the husband] in itself has caused mental agony and emotional trauma to the appellant [the wife] which is sufficient to make out a ground of mental cruelty,” the court said.
The High Court said that the woman had not even been cross-examined in the family court in connection with her testimony. “Therefore, there is no convincing reason not to accept the uncontroverted testimony of the appellant,” the court said.
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