Gokal Chand Mital, J. - (1.) Smt. Bimla filed a petition for divorce against her husband Rohtas. During the pendency of the divorce proceedings, she also filed an application under Sec. 27 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 (for short the Act) for payment of the value of the articles presented to her at the time of the marriage at those articles had been misappropriated or retained by her husband. By order dated 24th Aug., 1985, the court below granted a decree of divorce and that matter is no longer in dispute. As regards the application under Sec. 27 of the Act the wife had filed Annexure wherein the articles given to her were mentioned. The court below relied on Prathibha Rani Vs. Suraj Kumar and another, AIR 1985 Supreme Court 628 and came to the conclusion that the jewellery, clothes etc. could be used only by the wife and were Istridhan and she was entitled to get back the same. In view of that decision, the value of those articles was assessed by the Court below at Rs. 10,000.00 and an order was passed directing the husband to pay that sum to the wife. This is husband's revision against the order passed by the court below under Sec. 27 of the Act.
(2.) The learned counsel has argued that the jewellery and the clothes which were given to the wife at the time of the marriage have been rightly found by the court below to be Istridhan, but his grievance is that section 27 of the that Act relates to the passing of an order for disposal of the property which may belong jointly to both the husband and the wife and not the Istridhan. In support of the argument, reliance is placed on para 17 of Pratibha Rani's case (supra).
(3.) Learned counsel appearing for the wife was unable to controvert the argument. Faced with this situation, he argued that if the list Annexure 'A' is seen, there are several items of articles which were given jointly to the parties and at least qua them an order can be made. He referred to the items like Sofa Set, Blankets, Beddings, Utensils Trunks, etc. These articles would certainly belong jointly to the parties and would be covered by Sec. 27 of the Act, The value of these articles has been stated to be Rs. 5,840.00. This proposition could not be controverted by the counsel for the husband except that there was no proof on the record as to the value of the aforesaid articles. The value of the Sofa Set, Blankets, Beddings, Utensils, etc. which has been stated to be Rs. 5,840.00 cannot be said to be exaggerated.;