Tamil Nadu parents unite for kid

Chennai: Reena (name changed) moved to the edge of her seat, her elbows placed on the desk in front, her palms covering her face. A few seconds later, tears were flowing down her cheeks. The 32-year-old senior programmer with a major IT company broke down as her husband, Karthik (35), (name changed) consoled her. This was the first time her husband, also an IT professional, had touched her in three years.

This scene unfolded in one of the benches arbitrating family court cases during the National Lok Adalat at the Tamil Nadu State Legal Services Authority (TNSLA) campus near the Madras high court on Saturday.

“Reena and Karthik had an inter-religious marriage after years of courtship. Things were rosy until they had their first child,” R. Sumithra Chakkaravarthy, counsel for Reena, said.

They started living separately without either of them applying for a divorce.

However, things started getting messy after Karthik sought custody of the child and filed a complaint with local police.

In retaliation, Reena took the legal route and sought an injunction restricting him from having the child. The case went on for three years at the Madras HC.

The couple lived their separate lives and saw each other only at the court hearings. They were summoned to appear for the Lok Adalat where they were counselled in the pre- negotiation stage itself.

“Both of them were beginning to see how the irrationality of their decision was affecting their child,” Sumithra said.

Justice S. Nagamuthu who got wind of the situation that the couple were convinced in the pre-negotiation stage itself advised the couple to settle any disputes in marriage amicably among them. “Why do you want to spend your lives in litigation?” he asked the couple. Reena and Karthik walked back together to their child waiting at home.