The Supreme Court refused to quash bigamy proceedings against a man relying on a UK divorce. The ruling reinforces that foreign matrimonial decrees must satisfy Indian law to gain recognition.Stock photo used for illustrationNewdelhi,Nov 3, 2026 18:34 ISTThe Supreme Court has held that a divorce decree granted by a foreign court on the ground of irretrievable breakdown of marriage is not valid in India, news agency Press Trust of India reported.A bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Shree Chandrashekhar made the observation while dismissing a man's plea to quash a case against him for bigamy and criminal conspiracy.
However, the court quashed the criminal proceedings against his parents and second wife.According to PTI, the bench said: "In our view, the foreign divorce decree was passed in contravention of the existing matrimonial law in India and on a ground that is not even recognised statutorily.""This not only violates the legal threshold of Section 13 of the CPC, which every foreign decree has to pass through, but also the observations made by this Court as to the conditions required to be fulfilled by a foreign decree to be enforceable in India," the bench said. The Supreme Court said the sanctity of matrimonial status could not be allowed to yield to the principle of an inconvenient forum, or "forum non conveniens"."We cannot accept this submission in the manner canvassed as accused No.1/husband was married to respondent No.2/first wife in India under the Hindu rites, rituals and customs," the bench said.
It added: "Thus, even if the second marriage took place outside India, the allegations under Section 494 of the IPC cannot be said to be diluted since enquiry for the offence of bigamy cannot be confined to the place of second marriage but must necessarily take into account the subsisting matrimonial relationship." The man married his first wife on April 18, 2003, in Sattenapalli, Andhra Pradesh, according to Hindu rites and customs. They later lived in Hyderabad, where he was pursuing postgraduate studies at Osmania Medical College.He went to the UK on February 4, 2005, to pursue his career as a doctor, and his wife later joined him.
In August 2007, she returned to her parental home in Sattenapalli for childbirth. The man claimed that she did not return to the UK despite repeated requests.After their relationship deteriorated, the husband filed divorce and custody proceedings before the competent court at Narasaraopet in Andhra Pradesh's Guntur district.
The proceedings were dismissed. He later appealed in the high court but subsequently withdrew the appeal.The man was granted UK citizenship on February 1, 2013.
He then filed divorce proceedings against his first wife before the Cambridge County Court in England, which granted him a divorce in 2014 on the ground of irretrievable breakdown of marriage. He later remarried in Norfolk in the UK.Almost two years later, the first wife filed a complaint at Sattenapalli town police station in Guntur under Sections 494 and 120B, read with Section 34, of the Indian Penal Code.The Supreme Court refused to quash the case against the man, holding that the foreign divorce decree did not meet the requirements for enforcement in India.
It, however, ended the criminal proceedings against his parents and second wife.- Ends