INTRODUCTION
It is being truly said that the sole thing which is constant in this world is change. The Indian society has observed a drastic change in its living pattern within the past few years. People are slowly and gradually opening their minds towards the concept of pre-marital sex and live-in relationships. However, this transformation has been continuously under criticism and highly discussed per se concepts lack legality and acceptance by the society. Unlike marriage, in live-in relationships couples aren't married to every other but live together under the identical roof that resembles a relation like marriage. In other words, we are able to say its cohabitation. In India, only those relations between a person and a lady is taken into account to be legitimate where marriage has taken place between the two supported existing marriage laws otherwise all other kind of relationships are deemed to be illegitimate.
The reason behind people choosing to own a live-in relationship is to test the compatibility between couples before getting legally married. It also exempts partners from the chaos of family drama and lengthy court procedures just in case the couple decides to break-up. regardless of the reason, it's very evident that during a conventional society like ours, where the institution of marriage is taken into account to be “sacred” an increasing number of couples favor to have a live-in relationship, as a perpetual plan, over marriage. In such circumstances, many legal and social issues have arisen which became the subject of debate. With time many incidents are reported and seen where partners in live-in relationships or a baby born out of such relationship have remained vulnerable for the very simple reason that such relationships are kept outside the realm of law. There has been gross misuse by the partners in live-in relationships since they are doing not have any duties and responsibilities to perform. This text seeks to analyze the judicial response to the concept of live-in relationships to date. It also talks about the rights available to live-in partners in India and also, what's the status of youngsters born out of such relationships.
INDIAN JUDICIARY AND LIVE-IN RELATIONSHIP
Indian judiciary is neither expressly encouraging nor prohibiting such kind of live-in-relationships in India. The judiciary is merely rendering justice in a very accordance with law in a particular case. The most concern of the judiciary is to forestall the miscarriage of justice. The judiciary chooses the cases keeps in mind the social mores and constitutional values.
The connotation of the phrase “in the character of marriage” is way from obvious and this is often already a ground for contestation of the PWEDVA. Within the case of Aruna Parmod Shah v. UOI, the petitioner challenged the constitutionality of the Act on the grounds that, first, it discriminates against men and second, the definition of “domestic relationship” contained in Section 2(f) of the Act is objectionable. Regarding the second, the petitioner argued that placing “relationships within the nature of marriage” at par with “married” status ends up in the derogation of the rights of the legally-wedded wife. The Delhi tribunal rejected both these contentions regarding the constitutional status of the Act. With relevancy the second contention, which is of concern to us, the court said that “there isn't any reason why equal treatment mustn't be accorded to a wife furthermore as a girl who has been living with a person as his “common law” wife or perhaps as a mistress”. During this case the judges interpreted “a relation within the nature of marriage” as covering both a “common law marriage” and a relation with a “mistress” without clarifying the legal and social connotations of those terms.
CONCLUSION
Live-in relationship has always been the main target of debates because it possess threats to our basic societal framework. it's not considered as an offense as there's no law until the date that prohibits this sort of relationship. so as to bring justice to those female who are the victims of live-in relationships Indian judiciary took a step, brought interpretations and made such arrangements valid. Still India has not legalized it, legalizing means having special legislation for it. As of now, there's no legislation or statute that specifically governs matters associated with succession, maintenance, guardianship with regard to live-in relationships. However, for defense of girls from domestic violence Act, 2005 legislature has acknowledged the proper of partners living in a very live-in relationship to induce protection. It's recognized live-in relationships through various judgments in order that individuals of the relationships will be shielded from abuse. At the identical time, courts frequently declined to form any quite positive steps towards legalizing such practice by allowing any compulsory agreements between unmarried couples as this might conflict with the overall society strategy. It winds up plainly obvious that the Indian judiciary isn't prepared to treat all quite living relations as appreciate marriage. Only stable and fairly long period of relations between the couples are given the advantage of the 2005 Act. it's the duty of the judiciary to make sure that law should accommodate with the changing scenario of the society. Though courts through various judgments and case laws attempted to induce a transparent picture regarding the status of live-in relationships, yet it remains unclear on various aspects, where there's an urgent need for having different sets of rules and regulation and codification with regards to such kind of relationship.