The Delhi High Court recently observed that while a mother’s anxiety for the wellbeing of her children can never be “over-emphasised”, her apprehension of “psychological trauma” to them need not be made an obstacle in their education.
The HC was hearing an appeal by a woman against a family court order refusing to interfere with a “joint decision” taken by her and her husband to send their children abroad for further studies.
A division bench of Justice Suresh Kumar Kait and Justice Neena Bansal Krishna in its August 1 order said, “We had also interacted with the children, in the chamber, who had expressed in clear and unequivocal terms that they both are keen to study abroad and it is with great effort and hard work that they have been able to get admission in their respective schools. Both the children expressed their intelligible decision of studying abroad. So being the case, the apprehension of the appellant mother that they may suffer from psychological trauma, seems to be borne out of her own fear and anxiety which need not be transmitted to the children or be made an obstacle in the future educational path of the children.”
The family court (South) Saket on May 4, in light of a previous “joint decision” of both parties to send the children abroad for further studies, “denied to restrain the admission of the two children in separate schools in the UK” and declined the woman’s request to get both the children admitted in the same school. Her prayer for her relocation in the vicinity of schools of her children in the UK was also disallowed.
While not seriously contesting that the children may be sent abroad, the HC noted that the woman “took a peculiar stand” that both the children must be sent to the same school. She had argued that the two children may suffer psychological trauma because of separation and should therefore be admitted to British School, here or be sent to the same school in the UK.
The HC said that when the atmosphere in the house is “surcharged with tension as a result of bitter squabbles between husband and wife”, it causes “misery and unhappiness to a child, who has to live in constant psychological strain in such a broken home”.
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“The anxiety of a mother for the well-being of the children can never be over-emphasised. The concerns may be genuine, but at the same time, it cannot be ignored and overlooked that she herself had initially taken a decision jointly with the respondent to let the children go abroad for their studies…Their own interest and hard work cannot be put to a naught because of the anxieties of the mother which may be well found as a mother, but are without any cogent basis when considered in the context of the best interest of the children,” the HC said.
It said that there was nothing preventing the mother from visiting the UK as and when she wants or taking up residence there. “Her desire to relocate to the UK cannot be considered as a concomitant (connected with) to the welfare of the children. Learned Judge, family court, has already made provision for her to visit the UK once a year to be with the children and any further claim of the appellant to seek relocation in the UK has been rightly declined,” the bench said while dismissing the woman’s plea.
Before the family court, the woman had also sought that her husband makes arrangements to ensure the relocation of her and her children in the vicinity of the same school in the UK and to bear all their living expenses upon such relocation.