A System Abused: How a 'Happy Couple' Misused the Family Court

Many things that had faded away have been resurrected—listening to the radio, watching movies in theatre, and several others.

Movies were once an addiction; 9 pm was almost always movie time, and the language or genre didn't matter. That habit has since  died down. While OTT platforms have taken over a part of it, the addiction itself largely doesn't exist anymore.

Instead, writing has become an obsession, and finding topics for it has become another addiction. In the life of a lawyer, especially after many years in the profession, experiences are overwhelmingly legal. Therefore, the law naturally provides the most fertile ground for topics.

Today's subject, for instance, is a little fraud that was exposed in Court 5A of the Kerala High Court. The court was hearing a set of matrimonial appeals between one Anu and one Bina.

(The names of all parties involved in this case have been changed to protect their privacy.)

Now, don't be surprised—they were not in a matrimonial tie with each other. The connection was one step removed: Bina was married to Rajan, who happens to be Anu's brother.

Essentially, the legal battle was between two sisters-in-law. All the while, the brother himself, the connecting link, was waiting just outside the boundary line, anxiously anticipating the result of their fight.

Rajan and Anu were two of five siblings, born to their parents, Sara and Thomas. The marriage of Sara and Thomas was a milestone in itself, coinciding with the very freedom of India.

Following their wedding, Sara’s father, out of love and affection for his daughter and the groom, executed a gift deed. It was titled a ‘streedhan kuri adharam’ (essentially, a dowry gift deed). This, thankfully for all involved, was a common practice and not yet frowned upon by the law, as it occurred long before the Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961.

To understand the legal tangle that followed, it's important to look at the spirit of the very Act that was passed years after that 1947 gift. The Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961, while it came later, provides the crucial legal framework.

First, Section 2 defines 'dowry' with a very wide net. The spirit of this section is that it considers any property or valuable security given either directly or indirectly, by one party to the other, or by parents, "in connection with the marriage" as dowry.

Second, and this is the critical point, Section 6 addresses what happens when such a gift is given. The absolute spirit of this section is to ensure that the dowry is for the benefit of the wife and her heirs. It mandates that if anyone other than the woman herself receives this property, they are legally bound to transfer it to her within a specific time. Until they do, that person (whether it's her husband or in-laws) holds that property merely in trust for her benefit. The law is clear: it is her property. This very principle would become the central battleground for Anu and Bina.

Once you grasp the legal concept, applying it to the facts of a case becomes much easier.

Moving forward, Bina’s marriage to Rajan took place in 1983. History repeated itself, as her family also executed a dowry gift deed in her favor before the wedding. She would later claim that her husband was merely a 'name lender' for this gifted property and held no true right to it.

In time, this property from the 1983 gift was sold. The couple then used those proceeds to purchase another property, which is the very one now at the center of these legal proceedings.

The seller of this new property was Sara (Rajan's mother), and the title she passed to them stemmed from that original 1947 dowry gift. Her husband, Thomas, could not be a party to this sale, as he had already left for his heavenly abode by 1986.

The storyline would be complete, but for a few more critical facts. This is where the legal tangle truly tightens.

In 1999, a comprehensive Family Settlement Deed was executed. The parties to this deed included Bina and her husband Rajan, the mother Sara, and all the siblings.

A crucial fact of this settlement is that the disputed 1986 property was explicitly brought into the common hotchpot (pool of assets) for partition, along with other family properties. This fact directly contradicts any claim of ignorance Bina might have about the partition.

Under the terms of this 1999 settlement, Bina and her husband were allotted a separate commercial property, the benefits of which they have enjoyed ever since. The mother, Sara, was allotted the disputed 1986 property. Following the settlement, Sara, as the legal owner, subsequently transferred this property to her daughter, Anu.

This brings us to the current litigation. Despite having accepted and benefited from the 1999 settlement, Bina has now filed a suit in the Family Court. She seeks a declaration of title over the 1986 property, effectively asking the court to ignore two inconvenient documents: the 1999 Family Settlement she was a party to and the mother's subsequent valid transfer to Anu.

The forum she chose was highly strategic, leveraging two key pieces of legislation. First, she took advantage of Section 7 of the Family Courts Act, which grants jurisdiction over disputes "between the parties to a marriage... in respect of the property of the parties or of either of them." By framing this complex inheritance battle as a simple spousal property dispute, she gained entry into this specialized court.

Second, having established jurisdiction, she likely claimed the benefit of Section 6 of the Dowry Prohibition Act. This was the necessary next step in her strategy: a calculated attempt to get over the "limitation," that leveler, which is a fine cutting sword when it comes to litigation.

In the witness box, Bina was a disaster. She admitted that her marriage to Rajan is on and kicking and that she had received his blessings before coming to face the cross-examination. She even admitted that they have travelled the globe several times together and hopefully may do it again.

It is surprising, then, that the learned judge decreed the suit. The judge held that Thomas (the father-in-law) did not get any right as per the 1947 dowry gift. Thus, even without Sara herself asking for such a declaration, the late Thomas's proprietary rights vanished into thin air.

The logical implication of this finding was that Sara's 1986 deed to Bina was not incomplete, as she alone held full title to sell. Furthermore, the judge held that Bina had the protection of the trust under Section 6, thus making her immune to the law of limitation. The court effectively placed a 'time stop' in 1986 to declare Bina's title.

According to this decree, the 1999 Family Settlement is null and void—as the inclusion of the 1986 property into the hotchpot was itself illegal—and so, consequently, were all subsequent deeds, including the one to Anu. Even a beginner in law would get his head spinning thinking about the consequences of such a decree.

So, while Anu eventually got justice, it is a case where the system itself failed miserably.

The facility of the Family Court was misused for a decade. It was not used by a spouse in distress, but by a "happy couple"—Bina and her husband, who admitted their marriage was "on and kicking"—to experiment with litigation, hoping to gain "something more" from their family inheritance.

This abuse is critical because it defeats the entire purpose for which the Family Courts were created. The Family Courts Act, 1984, was enacted for a specific, noble reason. The Preamble of the Act states its goal is "to promote conciliation in, and secure speedy settlement of, disputes relating to marriage and family affairs."

The Statement of Objects and Reasons was even clearer: it sought to create a forum that was not adversarial, one that would operate in a "congenial atmosphere" to help parties "settle disputes in an amicable manner." It was designed to avoid the very delay and expense that this case exemplified.

Bina's suit was the exact opposite of this. It was a complex, adversarial property dispute, not a matrimonial one. She was not seeking conciliation; she was seeking to invalidate a settlement from which she had already benefited.

By routing this high-stakes property fight through the Family Court, the state revenue also suffered. Had this

been filed as a proper civil suit for declaration of title, it would have required substantial ad valorem court fees based on the value of the subject matter. Instead, a forum designed for vulnerable families was used to litigate a valuable property dispute on a nominal fee.

A "cold storage" exists in our justice system, one that can accommodate cases that are born only to become decade-old files. In this instance, that long delay occurred at the Family Court level, where the original suit languished.

Thanks are due, then, to the honorable High Court bench for identifying the little fraud "early in the day" and deciding the appeal swiftly, bringing solace to the aggrieved Anu. She was forced to fight an unnecessary legal battle, and even with all the proactive measures she took, it took her a decade to finally get justice by overturning the erroneous decree.

Her appeals were allowed, with costs, and with a firm direction to hand over possession within a period of four months.