Wrangling over alimony and settlements has been a common phenomenon down the years but cut to 2012. Lawyers now find a new emerging trend in family courts. Instead of men paying alimony and divorce settlements, it’s the women who are now coming forward to pay settlements and compensation to their divorce reluctant husbands so that they can quickly get on with their lives.
The women shell out money to get rid of the legal hassles of lengthy divorce procedures and to quickly move on with their lives. These women are working, independent and mostly aged in their late-20s and early 30s and place a premium on time. “To get a quick and easy divorce, women are coming forward to pay the legal charges, compensation and settlements to their husbands. They just don’t want to contest the case and drag the divorce procedure for years by letting the spouse appeal to higher courts. All they want is to begin life anew at the earliest and don’t mind denouncing permanent alimony,” pointed out family court advocate Anita Salabh Jain.
28-year-old V. Janaki (name changed), working in the telecommunication department, had filed a dowry harassment case against her husband, a government employee. “My husband got bail and said that he would contest the case and even move the Apex Court to take revenge on me for sending him to jail, as it had cost him his job. It would simply mean our divorce case might get dragged on for years while it was impossible for me to stay with a abusive husband. I withdrew the criminal case against him, decided to forego permanent alimony, gave him adequate compensation for his lost job, paid the security amount and all legal expenses, all of which amounted to a few lakhs of rupees,” she said, adding that after a few counseling sessions and all these compromises, her husband agreed to go in for a mutual divorce.