Supreme Law News

SC grants Woman's Right to Residence Under the Domestic Violence Act

In a significant judgement, overruling old judgement Supreme Court has ruled that a woman facing domestic violence has a right to reside in a ‘shared household’ even if it is owned or rented by her in-laws and the husband has no legal right in the property.

In a significant departure from old judgement where the court ruled that in domestic violence case, women has no right to stay at house, if it is not owned or rented by her husband.

The judgment, delivered by a bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan, has held that an aggrieved woman has a right to reside in a house although she or her husband may not own the premises jointly or singly, or might have taken it on rent jointly or singly.

It said the household may even belong to a joint-family or is rented by the woman’s in-laws but the complainant still has a right to reside in it if she has been living there after her marriage. It would also not matter if she has been compelled to move out after the discord since the house will still be treated as a ‘shared household’, entitling her to live in it once she files a complaint under the Domestic Violence Act.

What does this verdict change for women facing domestic violence?

In 2007, the Supreme Court had ruled that an aggrieved woman will have a right to reside in a house only when it is owned or tenanted by the husband. It said that if her in-laws own the house and the husband has no legal right in it, she cannot assert her right to live there.

The latest verdict by the three-judge bench overrules the 2007 judgment and gives an interpretation in favour of the women’s right to residence. It has said the 2007 judgment did not interpret the law correctly.

What is a 'shared household' where a complainant can assert a right to residence?

The shared household, the court has now ruled, is the house where the complainant was either living at the time when application was filed or was living in the recent past but has now been excluded from the use or she is temporarily not there because of the adverse circumstances. The living of a woman in a household has to refer to a living which has some permanency.

The court has said that mere fleeting or casual living at different places shall not make a shared household. The intention of the parties and the nature of living including the nature of household have to be looked into to find out as to whether the parties intended to treat the premises as shared household or not. And once satisfied that a particular house is a shared household, a court can grant an entitlement in favour of the woman of the right of residence under the shared household irrespective of her having any legal interest in the same or not.

What is the right a complainant has in a house under the Domestic Violence Act?

The Act does not give any title or proprietary rights in favour of the aggrieved person. It merely secures a ‘right of residence’ in the ‘shared household’ for the complainant. The statute makes sure that a woman, facing domestic violence, always has a roof on her head. It, therefore, provides to her a right to residence in a building where she has lived in a domestic relationship with her husband and his parents or siblings.

The entire Scheme of the Act is to provide immediate relief to the aggrieved person with respect to the shared household where she lives or has lived. But it does not give her any right in the title of the property in question if her husband or she herself does not have a legal right otherwise.

Apart from a wife, can anyone else too claim a right to residence?

Yes. There can be other cases of domestic relationships such as an orphaned sister, or widowed mother, living in her brother's or son's house. Both are covered by the definition of domestic relationship under the law. In such a case too, if the widowed mother or sister is threatened with dispossession, they can secure a right to residence under the Act, notwithstanding exclusive ownership of the property by the son or brother.

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Dr. Ajay Kummar Pandey

( LLM, MBA, (UK), PhD, AIMA, AFAI, PHD Chamber, ICTC, PCI, FCC, DFC, PPL, MNP, BNI, ICJ (UK), WP, (UK), MLE, Harvard Square, London, CT, Blair Singer Institute, (USA), Dip. in International Crime, Leiden University, the Netherlands )

Advocate & Consultant Supreme Court of India, High Courts & Tribunals.