Bombay High Court: A Division Bench of S.J. Kathawalla and Surendra P. Talwade, JJ., while addressing petition wherein the mother has complained of facing harassment through her daughter, held that,
if children cannot take care of their parent/s and allow them to live in peace, they atleast ought not to make their life a living hell.
Petitioner is an ex-government employee and respondent 1 is one of the 5 daughters of the petitioner.
Petitioner states that she is mentally as well as physically tortured by her daughter and has been residing with the petitioner forcefully with her 19 year old son.
An application was also filed under Section 4 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 by the petitioner before respondent 2 seeking eviction of respondent 1 from the flat.
Respondent 1 had also threatened her father on one instance wherein she said that “if you force me to leave the house then I will lodge a police complaint against you that you are molesting me.”
Thereafter, respondent 1 kept on administering threats to her father, who was unable to do anything since he felt totally helpless. Not only the Petitioner and her husband were harassed by Sarita, but even her son (who was a minor) started dictating terms to the Petitioner and her husband, who did not retaliate under the fear that Sarita will malign their image in society.
After the demise of petitioner’s husband, respondent 1 intensified her harassment towards the petitioner. Respondent 1 had also destructed the petitioner’s cell phone so that nobody could directly contact her.
Petitioner once got a chance to talk to one of her daughter(Vaishali) who flew from Singapore to meet her and at that time petitioner gathered some courage and narrated the misdeeds that respondent 1 used to conduct on petitioner by beating her up, making her remain without clothes and used to give her food only once a day.
Later, Vaishali and petitioner filed a complaint against the respondent 1 and also got published an article about the misconduct of respondent 1.
After undergoing several tests, it was confirmed that the Petitioner had comminuted fracture and that her nerves were severely damaged around her shoulder and neck area, one nerve in the left arm was totally damaged, for which the Petitioner had to undergo various surgeries. She lived with a fractured shoulder and broken nerves for almost five months under house arrest by the Respondent 1, without even plaster or support, leave aside proper medication.
Bench on talking with petitioner gathered an impression that she seriously apprehends physical and mental harassment and consequently threat to her life at the hands of respondent 1, if she goes to reside in her own Flat without respondent 1 being evicted from the same.
Court made it extremely clear that,
if children cannot take care of their parent/s and allow them to live in peace, they atleast ought not to make their life a living hell.
Bench assured the petitioner that is she lives in her own flat and face any harassment from respondent 1 or her son, she will be provided all assistance, both by the Court and police authorities.
Installation of CCTV cameras inside the flat has been directed.
Respondent 1 and her son, both have been sternly warned . Senior Inspector of local police station under who jurisdiction the flat come has been directed to give all assistance to the petitioner.
Respondent 1 and her son will not obstruct entry of any of the relatives whom petitioner wants to meet. Also respondent 1 and her son are not allowed to invite or bring any of their guests to the flat without prior permission of petitioner through her advocate. [Rajani B. Somkuwar v. Sarita Somkuwar, 2020 SCC OnLine Bom 696 , decided on 05-06-2020]
