Heard on I.A No. 3313/2012, an application under Section 5 of Limitation Act for condoning the delay of 15 days in filing the Civil Revision.
Considering the avements made in the application, the same is hereby allowed.
Also, heard on the question of admission and perused the record.
This Civil Revision under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 is directed by the revisionist/non-applicant/wife against the impugned orders dated 08.05.2012 and 23.07.2012 passed by the First Additional District Judge, Vidisha in Civil Suit No. 87-A/2011 (HMA), whereby her applications under Order 7 Rule 11 read with Section 151 of CPC and under Order 47 Rule 1 read with Section 151 CPC, respectively, have been rejected.
Learned counsel appearing on behalf of the revisionist has argued that the respondent/applicant/husband and his witnesses specifically stated in their statements that in the month of July, 2000 revisionist/wife was residing at Gwalior and further while his (husband's) posting in Tenga Valley, State of Arunachal Pradesh from October 2002 to March 2005, revisionist has not resided during that period with him, therefore, it is very much clear that respondent/applicant has filed divorce petition on the false and fabricated cause of action, hence, the divorce petition filed by the respondent/husband was not maintainable. Learned counsel has cited Saleem Bhai v. State of Maharashtra, (2003) 1 SCC 557 and Ram Prakash Gupta v. Rajiv Kumar Gupta, (2007) 10 SCC 59 in support of his contention.
No exhaustive statement of facts of the case are required to be narrated for the purpose of disposal of this revision petition. Suffice it to say that the respondent/applicant/husband, Rakesh Malhotra preferred a divorce petition under Section 13(i)(ia) and (ib) of Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 against revisionist/non-applicant, Smt. Krishna Malhotra (wife) before the Court of District Judge, West Kameng, District Bomdila (Arunachal Pradesh). The paragraphs No. 21 and 22 of the divorce petition regarding cause of action and jurisdiction of the Court runs as under:-
“21. That the petition is cognizable by this Hon'ble court as the cause of action arose on or about 20-07-2000 at Tenga Valley in the District of West Kameng (A.P) within the jurisdiction of this Hon'ble court.
22. That this Hon'ble court has jurisdiction to try this suit as the petitioner and the respondent both together last resided at Tenga Valley, District West Kameng (A.P) within the jurisdiction of this Hon'ble Court.”
During pendency of the aforesaid divorce petition, applicant/wife preferred a transfer petition before the Apex Court. The Apex Court vide its order dated 05.04.2010 passed in Transfer Petition (C) No. 988/2009 transferred the divorce petition to the Court of District Judge, Vidisha (Madhya Pradesh) with the direction that the transferee Court shall dispose of the same at an early date.
On the basis of the pleadings of the parties, the learned Trial Court, Vidisha framed four issues and recorded the evidence of applicant, A.W.1, Rakesh Malhotra, A.W.2, Anand Prakash and A.W.3 Kapil Hussain and fixed the case for evidence of non-applicant/wife, thereafter, applicant/wife filed an application under Order 7 Rule 11 read with Section 151 of CPC for dismissal of the divorce petition on the ground that the applicant/husband has filed divorce petition on false and fabricated cause of action. Learned Trial Court after hearing the parties rejected the application vide its order dated 8.5.2012 holding that according to the pleadings made in the divorce petition by the applicant prima-facie it seems that the cause of action mentioned therein is not to be incorrect and false. In other words, lack of cause of action has not been found and consequently, the review petition was also dismissed.
In the case of Saleem Bhai (supra) relied by the learned counsel for the revisionist, the Hon'ble Apex Court held that the Trial Court can exercise power under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC at any stage of the suit - before registering the plaint or after issuing summons to the defendant at any time before the conclusion of the trial, while, in the case of Ram Prakash Gupta (supra), the Hon'ble Apex Court dis-approved the rejection of the plaint under Order 7 Rule 11 of the CPC at a belated stage, after filing of written statement, framing of issues and cross-examination.
It is not out of place to mention here that vide order dated 23.01.2012 passed by this Court in Writ Petition No. 6762/2011, the Trial Court was also directed to expedite the hearing of the case and dispose of it as early as possible according to directions of Apex Court.
Therefore, after going through the impugned orders in the available factual matrix of the entire case and considering the submissions of the learned counsel for the revisionist, in the opinion of this Court, the applications filed by the revisionist have been rightly rejected by the Trial Court. There is no error of jurisdiction in the impugned orders that may call for any interference by this Court in exercise of its revisional jurisdiction under Section 115 of CPC. The revision petition is devoid of any merit and is, therefore, dismissed summarily.