Devinder Gupta, J.
1. In this Letters Patent Appeal, the appellant has challenged the judgment of the learned Single Judge dated March 7, 1990, allowing the appeal of the husband respondent, whereby the judgment and decree dated June 30, 1989, passed by the District Judge, Shimla, was set aside and a. decree for divorce was granted dissolving the marriage between the parties.
2. Marriage between the parties was solemnised on November 7, 1980, at Nirankari Colony, Delhi. A son named Saravpreet was born on January 4, 1982. After the marriage, the parties resided at Ranchi, Bangalore and Shimla. At the time of marriage the husband was holding the rank of Captain in the Indian Army and remained posted at Ranchi and Bangalore but subsequently left the job to assist his widowed mother in managing the family business at Shimla. The relations between the parties became strained in the year 1985 and ultimately on August 13, 1986, a petition under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 (Act No; 25 of 1955), (briefly the Act), was filed by the husband against the wife seeking a decree of divorce for dissolution of marriage on the ground that the wife after the solemnisation of marriage, had treated him with cruelty. The District Judge, Shimla, who tried the petition came to the conclusion that the respondent had not been in a position to establish by adducing legally competent evidence that the wife had treated him with cruelty as pleaded by him. He, however, was of the view that there had been some misunderstanding between the couple, which was not tackled properly resulting in litigation and the version given by the husband containing various instances of cruelty was not capable of being taken seriously. As a result of his findings, the petition was dismissed. The husband took the matter in appeal before this Court. The learned Single Judge has gone in minute details with respect to each of the instance constituting cruelty and has come to the conclusion that the evidence adduced by the husband was sufficient to warrant the finding that the wife had treated the husband, after solemnisation of marriage, with cruelty and there was no act on the part of husband condoning the acts of cruelty. The further conclusion on the basis of evidence and other factors on record is that the marriage has irretrievably been broken. On the basis of the findings recorded by him, the judgment and decree of the learned District Judge was set aside and the appeal filed by the husband was accepted by granting a decree for divorce dissolving the marriage between the parties.
3. We have heard the learned counsel for the parties and, with their help, gone through the record of the case.
4. The legal concept of cruelty and the kind or degree of cruelty necessary to amount to a matrimonial offence have not been defined by any statute of the Indian Legislature relating to marriage and divorce; nor has the expression been defined in the Matrimonial Causes Act, 1950. The accepted legal meaning of this expression, which is rather difficult to define, had been 'conduct or such character as to have caused danger to life, limb or health (bodily or mental), or as to give rise to a reasonable apprehension of such danger'. In Dr. N.G. Dastane v. Mrs. S. Dastane, AIR 1975 SC 1534, the Supreme Court critically examined the matrimonial ground of cruelty and observed that the inquiry in any case had to be whether the conduct charged as cruelty is of such a character as to cause in the mind of the petitioner a reasonable apprehension that it will be harmful or injurious for him to live with the respondent. It was also pointed out that it was not necessary, as under the English law that the cruelty must be of such a character as to cause danger to life, limb or health or as to give rise to a reasonable apprehension of such a danger though, of course, harm or injury to health, reputation, the working character or the like would be an important consideration in determining whether the conduct of the respondent amounts to cruelty. What was required was that the petitioner must prove that the respondent has treated the petitioner with such cruelty as to cause a reasonable apprehension in his mind that it will be harmful or injurious for him to live with the respondent.
5. Cruelty may be inferred from the whole facts and matrimonial relations of the parties and interaction in their daily life disclosed by the evidence. The question whether the respondent treated the petitioner with cruelty is a single question only to be answered after all the facts have been taken into account. It will not be a correct approach, as was done in this case by the learned District Judge, to put the various acts or conduct alleged into a series of separate compartments and say of each of them that by themselves they cannot pass the test of cruelty and, therefore, that the totality cannot pass that test.
6. The case in hand is required to be dealt with on the basis of the aforementioned legal position. According to the husband, the behaviour of the wife immediately after the marriage when they started residing at Ranchi was such which put him in an embarrassing and humiliating situation. The wife had been indulging in petty fault finding and scolding the husband. The relations started becoming strained and even at Bangalore they could not pull on well and ultimately the wife had to be sent to Delhi to reside with her mother. After the husband had resigned from the Army and had started looking after the family business at Shimla, the wife joined him. Both of them started living with the mother of the husband but after some time due to the indifferent attitude of the wife, the husband had to arrange for a separate residence in rented premises which were in the name of his mother. There also they could not pull on well. A more serious allegation was levelled by the husband against the wife that her behaviour towards his mother was not respectful and rather she (the wife) had at one occasion slapped his mother and on another gave a beating to her. According to the husband, when he scolded her for this misbehaviour, she left for Delhi to reside with her mother and on August 3, 1986, when she came back to Shimla, she stayed in a hotel and lodged a report with the police against husband under Dowry Prohibition Act. According to the husband, not only the instances referred to in the petition were the specific allegations or instances but there are many more attributable to the wife amounting to treating him with cruelty. The wife not only denied the specific instances of cruelty but came out with a plea that, in fact, it was the husband who was to be blamed The husband as well as the other members of his family were not satisfied with her and they were demanding more dowry. The sister of the husband had even levelled false allegation of theft against her in the presence of the husband and his mother but the husband instead of supporting her sided with his sister without verifying the facts. According to the wife, the conduct and behaviour of the husband were not proper and situation had reached a stage where she feared danger to her life and health. Her further allegation is that the petition had been brought about on false and baseless allegations merely to enable the husband to get divorce and marry another girl of his choice.
7. In support of his plea, the husband examined himself and three other witnesses, including his mother. In rebuttal, the wife herself appeared in the witness box and also examined her mother. It is not necessary for us to deal in detail the evidence of various witnesses as the learned Single Judge has dealt with the same in great details in his Judgment.
8. The main thrust of the arguments on behalf of the appellant before us was that there is variance between the pleadings and proof in so far as the particulars constituting cruelty are concerned. It was urged that the allegation of giving beating by the wife to the mother of the husband has not been pleaded properly and the husband has tried to improve upon the case. We find from the averments made in the petition that at two places the husband has pleaded that the wife even went to the extent of slapping his mother and also gave beating to her. In our opinion, this is a sufficient plea. Pleadings are required to contain only a statement in a concise form of the material facts and evidence is not required to be stated in minute details. By raising this plea, the attention of the wife was clearly drawn to the fact that there is an allegation against her of giving beating to her mother-in-law. During the course of evidence, the husband stated that Me wife had at one occasion laid down his mother on the floor and sat upon her and slapped her. The mother of the husband, who appeared as PW-4, supported this version by saying that she was pushed by daughter-in-law and due to which she fell down and thereafter she sat on her chest and tried to throttle her. The learned District Judge in his judgment has observed with respect to this instance that it was not to be taken seriously. There is no reason for us to disbelieve this version of the husband and his mother on the mere denial of the wife with regard to this incident. Such a treatment given by the wife to her mother-in-law would naturally hurt the feelings of the husband. After going through the statement of the mother, we have found that it was not on one or two occasions only but on several occasions that such a treatment was meted out by the wife to her mother-in-law without any rhyme or reason. This fact alone is sufficient to constitute mental cruelty to the husband by the wife.
9. Learned counsel for the appellant has pointed out that it will not be safe to place reliance upon the version of the husband and his mother in the absence of any corroborating evidence, especially when the wife has flately denied the aforementioned incidents. Such an argument in the facts and circumstances of the case has no force. In a matrimonial case it is not always possible to get absolute corroborating evidence or contradiction of the evidence in matters which concern the members of the family. It is on the basis of preponderance of evidence that such matters are required to be decided. It being a case in which the mental cruelty has been made the basis for grant of decree for divorce the sum total of the entire evidence has to be weighed. There is no such evidence that the beating was ever given by the wife to the mother-in-law in the presence of any witness, therefore, it was not necessary for the husband to have led any corroborative evidence.
10. Reading of the statements of the husband and wife leaves no manner of doubt that it was the wife who, in fact, was at fault which resulted in strained relations between the parties. During the course of pleadings, the wife levelled allegations against the sister of her husband of having accused her of theft, which plea the wife has not been able to prove during the course of evidence and this fact was denied by the husband. Even the allegation of demanding dowry was not established and the wife admitted that the report which she lodged with the police was not found to be correct. Allegations of such like nature levelled by one spouse against the other, if not proved to be correct, would also constitute legal cruelty.
11. The learned counsel for the appellant took up another plea that even if the version of the respondent-husband is accepted even than as the husband and wife continued to live together, the conduct of the husband in continuing to live with his wife would amount to condoning the acts of cruelty. This argument has also no force. Condonation means forgiveness of the matrimonial offence and the restoration of offending spouse to the same position as he or she occupied before the offence was committed. To constitute condonation there must be, therefore, two things : forgiveness and restoration. Evidence of condonation does not consist in the mere fact that the spouses continued to share a common home during or for some time after the spell of cruelty. Cruelty, generally, does not consist of a single, isolated act but consists in most cases of a series of acts spread over a period of time. Law does not require that at the first appearance of a cruel act, the other spouse must leave the matrimonial home lest the continued cohabitation be construed as condonation. Such a construction will hinder reconciliation and thereby frustrate the benign purpose of marriage laws. But condonation is always subject to the implied condition that the offending spouse will not commit a fresh matrimonial offence, either of the same variety as the one condoned or of any other variety. 'No matrimonial offence is erased by condonation. It is obscured but not obliterated'. Since the condition of forgiveness is that no further matrimonial offence shall occur, it is not necessary that the fresh offence should be ejusdem generis with the original offence. Condoned cruelty can therefore be revived, say by desertion or adultery. 'Condonation' under Section 23(1) (b) therefore means conditional forgiveness, the implied condition being that no further matrimonial offence shall be committed. It is necessary that there should be evidence on the record of the case to show that cruelty has been condoned. (See : AIR 1975 SC 1534, Dr. N.G. Dastane v. Mrs. S. Dastane). In the instant case there is no evidence on record adduced by the wife that the husband had ever condoned the acts of cruelty on the part of wife.
12. After going through the evidence on record, we have no ground to differ with the reasoning recorded by the learned Single Judge incoming to the conclusion that the acts and instances complained of as also the conduct of the wife taken together are sufficient to warrant a conclusion that the wife has treated the husband with cruelty.
13. During the course of hearing of this appeal, attempts were made by us to effect reconciliation but such efforts failed. The respondent-husband has lost faith in the wife to an extent that he is not ready and willing to live with her at any cost. The learned single Judge rightly observed that the things have reached such a pass that it has become impossible for them to live together. We are also of the view that it would be in the interest of justice to dissolve such a marriage and there would be no use of keeping the two young persons tied by the matrimonial relationship when they cannot live in peace.
14. In view of the above, while affirming the findings recorded by the learned single Judge, we dismiss the appeal and leave the parties to bear their respective costs.