Is Divorce a women right Centric? Category: Women Rights written by Deepti Bhattarai Love is a matter of chance, matrimony a matter of money and divorce a matter of course. The rate of divorce is increasing rapidly. The state had implemented some rules regarding divorce which is beneficiary to the women. It is easy for women to get divorce than that of male. The rate of divorces to that of court marriage is extremely high. Kathmandu District Court presented a statistics of 2068 where 249 registered their marriage whereas, 1,317 have dissolved their marriage. Santosh Thapa of Parbat district court states “If the data of divorce rate is analyzed then it is doubling each year. Almost 85% of the divorce case is filed by women.” But have we ever thought why are women filing those divorce cases? Is it the greediness of those women for alimony which they get after divorce or it is their need? Has Nepal turned into that condition that 85% the women left their husband for money? Are 85% of the women ready to take the blame of being characterless as after divorce those women will have to live in same societies which have still male domination? That society where for every good cause the credit goes to male and for every bad cause the disadvantage goes to female. If those divorce cases are analyzed then the violence against women is evident. Albeit the fact that decisions to fight against her husband is a tough one to make, still it is a step forward towards a new dawn. 1.Divorce Law in Nepal Divorce law in Nepal is comprised within the General Code of the country, Muluki Ain. Chapter 12 of Muluki Ain i.e. On Husband and wife has both substantive and procedural provisions that regulate divorce in Nepal. Nepal does not have any specific act as such to regulate divorce. However, divorce laws in Nepal have gone through some tremendous changes after eleventh amendments and many other changes have taken place which is mentioned below: a)Substantive law: Grounds for divorce •The first section of this chapter recognizes false representation, force marriage to be voidable marriage and has explicitly recognized child marriage as a void marriage. This is taken as a ground for divorce; • After the eleventh amendment, mental torture has been added as the ground for divorce; •Some Nepal Acts to Maintain Gender Equality Amendment Act, 2063 has added marital rape as one of the ground for divorce; •Section three of Number 1 Chapter 12 on husband and wife ,states, in case of the mutual consent, under any circumstances, divorce can be filed; and • A new provision amended stating that if a wife concludes marriage with some other person, the relationship between husband and wife gets automatically dissolved is a very new and a different issue in Nepalese as well as in the Hindu laws. Custody of the child: The concept of custody of the child is included within the divorce law of Nepal. According to the decision of parents, minor will stay with either of the parents. Unless any prejudices are seen, child should be given chances occasionally to meet both of the parents. If the mother is subsisting the minor, as per the status of father and as directed by court, he has to look after the expenses of the minor and if the mother have a high earning, father will have to look after the expenses of the minor. Economic provisions: Where the relation has been dissolved pursuant to Number 1 of this Chapter, the court shall make decision on divorce only after having partition between them. If husband has not taken his partition share, the court shall order the submission of an inventory of property, partition between the co-parceners, estimate the partition of a husband, and cause husband to pay monthly alimony for the maintenance and subsistence of such a wife, pending the execution of partition. This is the provision amended after the eleventh amendment. Alimony: If the wife seeking divorce does not want her partition share but annual or monthly expenses from husband, the court shall order the payment by husband of annual or monthly expenses on the basis of the property and income of the husband. The husband shall continue to make payment of such expenses until such a woman remarries. b)Procedural Law: The relaxation on the part of procedural can also be seen within the divorce law of Nepal. Prior to the directive order issued by Supreme Court to Legislative to amend the provision discriminating men, only women could directly file for divorce at courts, whereas men could only appeal through Village Development Committee or Municipalities. After a petition is filed at the concerned authority, first, the Village Development Committee or Municipalities tries for the reconciliation and tries to seek out the differences between the parties concerned. If the process of reconciliation does not end up in a positive note, within one year of petition submitted, along with an opinion by the Village Development Committee or Municipality, an application has to be sent to concerned District court. Though divorce maybe the solution for those women who have died each day from violation of women right each day. But is a divorce; woman’s right centric? The answer is both positive and negative too. Positive for those who had been suffering through crude women right violation, still there remain those women who misutilize it. “I’m a very good housekeeper; after every divorce I keep the house.” Moreover the state’s policy is not that beneficiary as divorce in one way though gives some property right as alimony to women but still the women don’t get capacity to uplift their life. Some of the divorced women want to get back into relationship with ex-husband; the state should make law as a medium for establishing human right of women in one way while on the other solving the problem that may include reformation, mediation if necessary. Divorce would be bliss, if that could lend any women to a capable, independent and efficient.
Posted on: Sun, 15 Sep 2013 09:46:26 +0000
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