A Delhi court on Wednesday granted divorce to cricketer Shikhar Dhawan on grounds of cruelty by his wife Aesha Mukerji.
The court accepted all the allegations made by Dhawan in his divorce petition against his wife on the ground that the wife either did not contest the said allegations or failed to defend herself.
As per Dhawan’s plea, the wife had initially said she would live with him in India. However, she failed to do so owing to a commitment to her former husband with whom she has two daughters.
“He (Dhawan) for no fault of his own had been through immense agony and anguish of living separately from his own son for years. Even though the wife denied the allegation, submitting that though she genuinely wanted to live in India with him, however due to her commitment towards her daughters from her previous marriage requiring her to stay in Australia, she could not come to live in India and that he was well aware of her commitment, yet she did not choose to contest the claim,” the court said.
“Hence, it stands proved that the wife backtracked from her assurance of setting up matrimonial home in India after marriage and thus made him suffer a long distance marriage and suffer immense agony and anguish of living separately from his own son for years,” it added.
The wife had committed to her ex-husband not to leave Australia where she presently lives with her two daughters and a son from Dhawan.
However, the court refused to pass any order on permanent custody of the couple’s son, and granted visitation rights to Dhawan to meet his son for an appropriate duration in India and Australia and also to chat with him over a video call. The court further ordered Mukerji to bring the child to India for visitation purpose including overnight stay with Dhawan and his family members, at least for half the period of school vacation during the academic calendar.
“Since petitioner is a reputed International Cricketer and has been pride of the nation, subject to petitioner approaching the Union Government of India, it is requested to take up the issue of visitation/custody of the minor son with its counterpart in Australia to help him have regular visitation or chatting with his own son or his permanent custody,” the court said.
