The Supreme Court held that the six-month waiting period for mutual-consent divorce under s.13B(2) of the Hindu Marriage Act is directory and may be waived where reconciliation is impossible, the statutory separation is over, and the parties have genuinely settled custody, maintenance and alimony. The waiting period exists to allow second thoughts, not to prolong an agreed parting.
The Supreme Court restated the broad factors a court must weigh in fixing permanent alimony — status, the wife's reasonable needs, qualifications and employment, independent income, the marital standard of living, sacrifices for the family, litigation costs and the husband's capacity. Dissolving the marriage under Article 142, it fixed a one-time settlement of roughly ₹2 crore, holding that alimony must secure a decent life without being punitive.
A five-judge Constitution Bench held that the Supreme Court may, under Article 142, dissolve a marriage that has irretrievably broken down to do complete justice — even without one spouse's consent and bypassing the family-court reference — and that the six-month cooling-off period under section 13B(2) of the Hindu Marriage Act is waivable in a fit case.
In 1995 a two-judge Bench of the Supreme Court held that a Hindu husband who converts to Islam cannot validly contract a second marriage while his first Hindu marriage subsists — the second marriage is void and the convert is guilty of bigamy under Section 494 IPC. A digest of the facts, the ratio on conversion and bigamy, and the obiter call for a Uniform Civil Code.
In 2020 the Supreme Court issued binding pan-India guidelines on maintenance across overlapping statutory regimes, prescribed a mandatory Affidavit of Disclosure of Assets and Liabilities, and ruled that maintenance is payable from the date of the application.
On 12 May 2026, a two-judge bench expunged findings of cruelty and desertion against a dentist wife who had relocated from Kargil to Ahmedabad for tertiary medical care and to pursue her practice, holding that 'marriage does not eclipse her individuality' and retaining the divorce decree on the ground of irretrievable breakdown under Article 142.
In January 2026, a Calcutta HC Division Bench upheld a divorce decree on the ground of cruelty under section 13(1)(ia) HMA, holding that a husband maligning his wife at her workplace, questioning her chastity and abusing her before colleagues strikes at the core of dignity protected under Article 21.
On 19 April 2024, the Supreme Court held that a Hindu marriage is invalid without the requisite Section 7 ceremonies; a registration certificate alone confers no marital status.
Calcutta HC holds a spouse who concealed a prior marriage and 498A history cannot win a cruelty divorce; clean hands and constructive desertion bar relief.