Rapid growth of disputes between couples and their families on worldly petty things, and incompatibilities in choosing the right partner has led to a proportionate increase in the number of divorce cases. Many social evil factors are responsible for the surge in their numbers. The most important reason is that women have started asserting their legitimate equal status in the family, thus often going to extremes of refusing to be dominated by their husbands even for their legitimate demands for restraint and patience as their mothers and grandmothers used to be.

On several occasions during hearing of matrimonial disputes, a senior judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Arijit Pasayat, had observed and commented rightly pointing out - "Hindu Marriage Act (HMA) has broken more homes than it has united." One such recent observation by him hit the headlines, and created uproar in the minds of the readers.

Divorce is not a sudden spurt in the society's life style or any new phenomenon but it is as old as the civilization of mankind itself. Divorces prevail in every country and in every religion, society and culture. Prior to codification and enactment of the Hindu personal law in India, there were ways and means to terminate a marriage, but it was so heavily inclined towards the problems and wishes of men that women's opinion or grievances were seldom taken into consideration.

While the Indian Constitution guaranteeing right to equality, codification and enactment of Hindu personal law - part of which is HMA - considered men and women equal partners in a marriage.

Providing equal rights to men and women in marriages waw one of the main considerations for a Bench comprising Justices Pasayat and S H Kapadia, who directed all state governments on August 14, 2006, to compulsorily register marriages.

The aim was to make liable devious husbands, who after deserting their wives for other women often denied their marriages with the complainant wives, taking advantage of the absence of any documentary proof of their marriage to frustrate court orders directing them to pay alimony to their abandoned wives.

Justice Pasayat could not have seriously said that the law enacted to give equal rights to women in marriage had broken more homes, as he was convinced about the utility of having the marriages registered.

The Hindu Marriage Act , thus, was enacted not to break marriages but to crystallize the rights of partners in marriage to help them live recognizing each others rights and limitations, with self-respect.

In the older days, a woman married to a schizophrenic made to live with him without complaining despite her husband being unable to consummate the marriage.

The fear of taunts from society used to make her swallow the mental torture, silently for years, without any involvement in the family life. In 2006, a Supreme Court Bench comprising Justices Ruma Pal and A R Lakshmanan ruled that abstinence by husbands due to mental disorder was a valid ground for divorce for women.

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