AHMEDABAD: In a battle for child custody between quarrelling parents, the Gujarat high court on Friday ordered the mother to give interim custody of a 4.5-year-old son for two months to his father who lives in the US.
The bench of Justice Sonia Gokani and Justice Mauna Bhatt said that the child will go to the US with his father and they would live there during the father’s vacation. The mother may accompany the child, if she wishes so. The court also said that the woman along with her parents can join the child to the US for a vacation because the man is ready to bear travel expenses for his wife and in-laws. After acrimonious relationship with her husband, the woman had returned from the US in 2017 with her infant son, who was born there. Since then, the woman did not return to her husband. The couple had migrated to the US after their marriage in 2015.
The man approached the high court complaining about the desertion on part of his wife and requested for the custody of the child, with whom he has not been able to live for more than four years. His lawyers submitted that the man came to India on three occasions and tried to convince his wife to return to the US with their child. They told the court that there were numerous efforts to reunite them, but things have not worked out.
The woman’s lawyer questioned the maintainability of the habeas corpus petition and objected to granting child’s custody to the father. The judges said that the petition is maintainable, and the HC also took into consideration an order passed by a US court on a suit involving the couple. The court said that the child is entitled to father’s love and warmth.
The woman tried to resist the child’s two-month custody to father in the US on the pretext of his education. When the court heard that the kid is in junior KG, the judges said that it is not a ground for not sending the child to the US. The court later got angry with the woman for her obstinate approach and said that it is not in the interest of the child.
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