HC annuls marriage over misrepresentation of facts at matrimonial portal

The Delhi High Court has upheld the annulment of a marriage after finding that the groom’s matrimonial profile contained false claims about his marital status and income.

The man had described himself as “unmarried” on the portal, despite having a child from a previous marriage, and also overstated his annual income.

A Bench of Justices Anil Kshetarpal and Harish Vaidyanathan in the August 20 judgment observed that “deliberate misrepresentation of one’s marital history is not a trivial omission but a clear suppression of facts going to the root of a marriage”.

The man had challenged an order of a family court which had earlier annulled the marriage on grounds of fraud.

He argued that his prior marriage had been “disclosed to the woman” during a meeting in November 2014. He further claimed that the online profile was “created by his parents”, who were “unaware” of his marital history and divorce.

The man argued that the term ‘unmarried’ was intended only to convey that he was single at the time of his second marriage.

Calling the arguments “artificial” and “flawed”, the court held that there is a clear difference between ‘unmarried’ and ‘divorced’, and that the omission of such critical facts amounted to deliberate misrepresentation.

“This was a detail that the respondent (woman) was entitled to know before making the life-altering decision to marry the appellant (man). Its concealment strikes at the very core of free and informed consent, rendering the marriage voidable,” the court said.

It found that the present case attracts the provisions of Section 12(1)(c) of the Hindu Marriage Act, which allows annulment of a marriage on specific grounds, including fraud.

The court noted that the existence of a child from the previous marriage was a profoundly material “to any prospective spouse’s decision on whether to marry”.

“Even if one assumes that the mere fact of a prior, now-dissolved marriage might not always be decisive, the existence of a child, in our view, could carry significant weight for making a decision,” the court remarked.