Marriage Declared Invalid By High Court Due To Husband’s ‘Relative Impotency’

Mumbai: A young couple’s marriage was annulled as they could not consummate it due to the husband’s ‘relative impotency’.

Delivering the order, the Aurangabad bench of Bombay High Court noted that their agony of frustration cannot be ignored, reported PTI.

A division bench of Justices Vibha Kankanwadi and S G Chapalgaonkar also said that this was a fit case to help “young sufferers of marriage” who could not connect with each other mentally, emotionally or physically.

The 27-year-old man approached the Aurangabad bench after a family court refused an application filed by his 26-year-old wife, seeking to annul the marriage on the admission stage itself, two months ago.

The high court said ‘relative impotency’ is a known phenomenon which is different from the normal impotency, which means the inability to copulate in general.

Relative impotency is a situation where a person might be capable of having intercourse but incapable of performing it with the spouse.

“In the present case, it can be easily gathered that the husband has relative impotency towards the wife. The reason for non-consummation of the marriage is this apparent relative impotency of the husband,” the high court said, observing that it could not ignore the fact that the matter concerned a young couple who faced the agony of frustration in their marriage.

The couple separated 17 days after getting married in March 2023. They told the court their marriage had not been consummated.