The Gujarat High Court in an order termed live-in relationships as "timepass" and mere "infatuation" and rejected an interfaith couple's plea for protection.
While the court admitted that the Supreme Court has validated live-in relationships, the Gujarat HC said that in the particular case, in which the petitioners had been together for just two months, they could not give any serious thought to their relationship.
The case concerns a 20-year-old woman who wants to be with her 22-year-old partner. The woman's family has, however, opposed this and has alleged that the man "enticed away" the woman. The man faces an FIR in Uttar Pradesh's Mathura. The woman is a Hindu and the man is a Muslim.
The plea before the Gujarat High Court sought the quashing of the FIR in UP and protection from arrest, according to the court order shared by Live Law.
Denying their request for protection, the two-judge bench of the Gujarat HC said that such relationships are "more about infatuation for the opposite sex" without any sincerity and they often result into timepass, according to Live Law.
"We are afraid to accept this superficial submissions advanced by learned counsel for the petitioners to the extent that this cannot be the ground for quashing of the FIR," said the court order.
While no Indian law specifically legalises live-in relationships, a series of judgements have given legal recognition to live-in relationships to a great extent, even if not all aspects of such relationships are clear.
"The Court feels that such type of relationship is more of infatuation than to have stability and sincerity. Unless and until the couple decides to marry and give the name of their relationship or they are sincere towards each other, the Court shuns and avoid to express any opinion in such type of relationship...No doubt that Hon'ble the Apex Court in number of cases, have validated the live-in relationship but in the span of two months in a tender age of 20-22 years, we cannot expect that the couple would be able to give a serious though over their such type of temporary relationship," said the Gujarat HC, as per the order uploaded by Live Law.
The High Court further said, "Our experience shows, that such type of relationship often result into timepass, temporary and fragile and as such, we are avoiding to give any protection to the petitioner during the stage of investigation."
The remarks by the Gujarat High Court come a month after the Allahabad High Court in a different order termed the live-in relationships "brutish" and "systematic design to destroy the institution of marriage in India" through the promotion of such relationships through popular culture. The order further said that live-in relationships cannot make a society healthy and stable and the "brutish concept of changing partners in every season cannot be considered to be the hallmark of a stable and healthy society".
