Present: Mr. M.S.Sachdev, Advocate for the appellant. Mr. Abinashi Singh, Advocate for respondents No.1 and 2. Mr. K.S.Kalhon and Ms. Reena, Advocates for respondent No.3. Anil Kshetarpal, J. Defendant No.2/appellant has filed regular second appeal against the judgement passed by the learned Additional District Judge, S.A.S. Nagar, Mohali. The issue which arises for consideration is that whether a daughter-in-law can claim self acquired property of parents of her husband to be shared household as defined in Section 2(s) of the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) and consequently entitled to protect her possession. The issue is not res integra and stands answered in S.R.Batra and Another v. Smt. Taruna Batra 2007 (3) SCC 169 by the Supreme Court, after discussing and interpreting the definition of shared household under Section 2(s) of the Act. The Supreme Court has held that the wife is only entitled to claim a right to residence in a shared household, which would only mean the house belonging to or taken on rent by the husband or the house which belongs to the joint family of which the husband is a member. The relevant discussion in this respect is extracted as under:-
26. If the aforesaid submission is accepted, then it will mean that wherever the husband and wife lived together in the past that property becomes a shared household. It is quite possible that the husband and wife may have lived together in dozens of places e.g. with the husband's father, husband's paternal grand parents, his maternal parents, uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters, nephews, nieces etc. If the interpretation canvassed by the learned counsel for the respondent is accepted, all these houses of the husband's relatives will be shared households and the wife can well insist in living in the all these houses of her husband's relatives merely because she had stayed with her husband for some time in those houses in the past. Such a view would lead to chaos and would be absurd.
27. It is well settled that any interpretation which leads to absurdity should not be accepted.
28. Learned counsel for the respondent Smt Taruna Batra has relied upon Section 19(1)(f) of the Act and claimed that she should be given an alternative accommodation. In our opinion, the claim for alternative accommodation can only be made against the husband and not against the husband's in- laws or other relatives.
29. As regards Section 17(1) of the Act, in our opinion the wife is only entitled to claim a right to residence in a shared household, and a `shared household' would only mean the house belonging to or taken on rent by the husband, or the house which belongs to the joint family of which the husband is a member. The property in question in the present case neither belongs to Amit Batra nor was it taken on rent by him nor is it a joint family property of which the husband Amit Batra is a member. It is the exclusive property of appellant No. 2, mother of Amit Batra. Hence it cannot be called a `shared household'.
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