When a Marriage Reaches a Dead End

A marriage may be beyond repair long before the last case between the parties is decided. The Supreme Court can end the litigation as a whole rather than case by case.

Where a marriage has broken down completely, the ordinary course is that each proceeding runs on its own timetable — maintenance, restitution, custody, criminal complaints, appeals. Years pass. Costs accumulate. Any children involved grow up inside the conflict.

In S v. State of Odisha & Ors., 2026 INSC 1060, the Supreme Court dealt with an estranged couple who had filed eighteen cases against each other, civil and criminal. The Court recorded that the marriage had reached a dead end.

• Exercising its power under Article 142 of the Constitution, the Court dissolved the marriage by mutual consent.
• It recorded payment of ₹35 lakh as permanent alimony to the wife.
• It quashed all eighteen pending proceedings between the parties.
• It directed that neither party should initiate fresh litigation against the other on the same issues.

The effect is a clean break: a single order that ends the marriage, settles the financial position, and clears the docket of everything arising from it.

Article 142 permits the Supreme Court to pass any order necessary for doing complete justice in a matter before it. The Court has used it both to dissolve a marriage by consent and, separately, to grant relief where a marriage has irretrievably broken down; this case proceeded on consent. It is a residual power, exercised sparingly, and ordinarily only where the ordinary legal process cannot deliver a just result within a reasonable time.

Its use in matrimonial matters has a particular logic. The parties’ real dispute is not any single case but the conflict itself; deciding eighteen cases separately would multiply cost without resolving anything.

• Consolidate the picture: list every proceeding between the parties, with court, number and stage.
• Quantify the settlement position, including maintenance and any one-time payment.
• Where both sides accept the marriage is over, consider whether a joint approach for relief under Article 142 is realistic.
• Record any agreed terms in writing before the order is sought, so the court can incorporate them.
• Note that the power is discretionary and reserved for cases where the ordinary route would defeat the purpose.

Article 142 relief is not a shortcut available on request. The Court exercises it where the facts are clear, the marriage is irretrievably broken, and the interests of any children and the financially weaker party are protected. A party seeking it must be prepared to show all three.