V REVATHI versus UNION OF INDIA & ORS.

Citation: [1988] 3 S.C.R. 73 · Decided: 25-02-1988 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: M.P. THAKKAR · Disposal: Dismissed
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Judgment (excerpt)

y 
V. REVATHI 
A 
v. 
UNION OF INDIA & ORS. 
FEBRUARY 25, 1988 
IM.P. THAKKAR AND MUAARI MOHQN DUTI, JJ.] 
B 
f-. 
Constitution of India, I950: Art. 14---Constitutional validity of 
ss. 198( 1) and 198(2) Cr. P. C.-Adultery-Right to prosecute husband 
/ 
not extended to the wife of the adulterer-Whether amounts to hostile 
., • \ 
discrimination on the ground of sex. 
· 
~· 
Criminal Procedure Code, 1973. Sections 198(1) and 198(2)-
c 
Adultery-Right to prosecute husband not extended to the wife of the 
-
adulterer-Whether hostile discrimination violative of Art. 14 of the 
Constitution of India. 
The constitutional validity of Section 198 Cr.P.C. has been called 
D 
into question by a wife by way of the present petition under Article 32 of 
the Constitution of India. 
The petitioner wife contended that whether or not the law permits 
• 
a husband to prosecute his disloyal wife, the wife cannot be lawfully 
--! 
disabled from prosecuting her disloyal husband. The petitioner asserted 
E 
that in so far as and to the extent Section 198(2) of the Code. of.Criminal 
Procedure operates as a fetter on the wife in prosecutising her adulterer 
husband, the relevant provisions is unconstitutional on the ground of 
abnoxious discrimination, 
,. 
--
·---"'. 
Dismissing the petiti011; this Court, 
F 
HELD: 1. Admittedly under the law, the aggrieved husband, 
whose wife has been disloyal to him, has no right under the law to 
prosecute his wife, inasmuch as by the very definition of the offence, 
only a man can commit adultery, not a woman. As between the husband 
and the wife social good will be promoted by permitting them to· 'make 
G 
~ 
up' or 'break up' the matrimonial tie rather than to drag each other to 
the criminal court. They can either condone the offence .in a spirit of 
'forgive and forget' and live together or separate by approaching a 
matrimonial court and snapping the matrimonial tie by securing 
divorce. They are not enabled to send each other to jail. Perhaps the 
children are saved from the trauma of one of their parents being jailed 
H 
73 
A 
B 
c 
D 
E 
F 
G 
H 
74 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[1988] 3 S.C.R. 
at the instance of the other parent. [77E-G] 
2. Section 497 does not confer any right on the wife to prosecute 
the husband who has committed adultery with another woman. Section 
497 of the Indian Penal Code and section 198(1) read with section 198(2) 
of the Criminal Procedure Code go hand in hand and constitute a 
legislative packet to deal with the offence committed by an outsider to 
the matrimonial unit who invades the peace and privacy of the matri-
monial unit and poisons the relationship between the two partners con-
stituting the matrimonial unit. The community punishes the 'outsider' 
who breaks into the matrimonial home and occasions the violation of 
sanctity of the matrimonial tie by developing an illicit relationship with 
one of the spouses subject to the rider that the erring 'man' alone can be 
punished and not the erring woman. [77H; 78A-B] 
Sowmithri Vishnu v. Union of India & Anr., [1985] Suppl. SCC 
137, referred to. 
3. Section 198 Cr.P.C. is not vulnerable to the charge of hostile 
discrimination against a woman. While the outsider who violates the 
sanctity of the matrimonial home is punished a rider has been added 
that if the outsider is a woman she is not punished. There is thus reverse 
discrimination in 'favour' of the woman rather than 'against' her. The 
law does not envisage the punishment of any of the spouses at the 
instance of each other. Thus there is no discrimination against the 
woman in so far as she is not permitted to prosecute her husband. A 
husband is not permitted because the wife is not treated an offender in 
the eye of law. The wife is not permitted as Section 198{1) read with 
section 198(2) does not permit her to do ·so. The law has meted out 
even-handed justice to both of them in the matter of prosecuting each 
other or securing the incarceration of each other. [78C-E] 
CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION: Writ Petition (Cr!.) 
No. 562of1986 
(Under Article 32 of the Constitution of India.) 
Ms. Geetha Ramaseshan and Ms. Seita Vaidilingam for the 
Petitioner. 
D.N. Dwivedi, Ashok K. Srivastava and S. Suri for the 
Respondents. 
V. REVATHI v. U.0.1. [THAKKAR, J.J 
75 
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by 
THAKKAR, J. Not only the option to 'make up' or 'break up' 
but also the right to 'haul up' the erring husband before a Criminal 
Court, is claimed by
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