July 26, 2011
 
The reason parents no longer lead their children in the right direction is because the parents aren’t going that way themselves. – Frank McKinney Hubbard.
 
Nowhere is this truth, apt to be focused on as we mark the Parents Day (July 24), reflected better than the family courts that deal with divorce and custody of children. These matters often go to the Supreme Court and we have a rulings of the apex court that answer the question posed in the headline. But, first the facts.
 
In custody cases, the child is the property of neither the mother nor the father, the Supreme Court has said in a recent case. Deciding the custody of two children of parents, one of them a non-resident Indian, a Bench of Justices Markandey Katju and C.K. Prasad said: “Cases of child custody are not decided on such considerations [whether the child is the property of the father or the mother], but on the consideration of what is in the paramount interest of the welfare of the child.”

The appellant, Paramjit Singh, is the father of Sahir and Ameya, aged 9 and 7. It was alleged that earlier the whole family was living in America, but about five years ago the mother, Ekta Gyani, brought the children to India; for the past five years, they have been residing with their mother in Chandigarh. Paramjit's plea for custody of the children was rejected by the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Rejecting his appeal, the Bench said: “We are of the opinion that it will not be in the interest of the welfare of the children to give their custody to their father. It is evident that since the age of 4 and 2 the children have been living with their mother in India. Hence, obviously they must have developed an emotional attachment to their mother. In such circumstances, it will be a terrible psychological trauma if they are torn away from their mother and handed over to their father.”

But the petitioner was entitled to visitation rights, the Bench said. It issued notice to the mother to decide on this question and posted the matter for further hearing on August 19.

It is notable that in a similar case in the Bombay High Court, the judges warned the parents against making their children pawns in their games and told the parents not to bring the children to the court during custody hearings.

In the above cases, children are of an age when they understand the issues and are traumatised with conflicting loyalties between the fighting parents. There are instances where new-borns in the maternity wards of public hospitals and maternity homes are exchanged for still-borns, with nurses sometimes colluding in the racket – new-borns are seperated from the mothers. The oldest such case goes back to 3000 years and involves King Solomon (son of David), who ruled Israel in 10th century BC. He was so wise and his judgments so admired that the expression ‘Solomon’s Wisdom’ has become a familiar expression. Here is how he handled the case of child custody.

Two harlots came to king Solomon and one woman said, “ This woman and I dwell in the same house; and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house. Then on the third day after I was delivered, this woman also gave birth; and we were alone; there was no one else with us in the house. This woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on it. She arose at midnight, and took my son from beside me, while I slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead son in my bosom. When I rose in the morning to nurse my child, behold, it was dead; but when I looked at it closely in the morning, it was not the child that I had borne”. But the other woman said, “No, the living child is mine, the dead child is yours.” The first said, “No, the dead child is yours, and the living child is mine”.

Then the king said, “Bring me a sword”. So a sword was brought and the king said, “Divide the living child into two, and give half to one, and half to the other”. Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means slay it”. Then the king answered and said, “Give the living child to the first woman, and by no means slay it; she is the mother”.

These days judges have to deal with divorcing couples full of bitterness and seeking revenge and children become the victims. Getting custody becomes an ego trip. But, there are cases where persons contest their paternity as in the celebrated case of ND Tiwari, former chief minister of UP, Central minister and who resigned his governorship of Andhra Pradesh on being cought on film, and projected by TV channels, in bed in the company of nubile dames.

In December 2010, Ujjwala Sharma, mother of Rohit Shekhar who has said he is the veteran politician's natural son, told the Delhi High Court that he was born out of her relationship with the former Congress leader. She told the court in a written statement that Tiwari drew her into an extra-marital relationship.

“Believing the repeated requests and being convinced of the love and affection shown by Tiwari hailing from a respectable and prestigious family, I submitted to emotional pressure and that culminated in the birth of Rohit Shekhar," Ujjwala Sharma, a former Congress party activist, said in her submission. Tiwari, 85, has been in the thick of controversy following Shekhar's suit seeking declaration from the court that he is the biological son of the former Congress leader. Tiwari refuted all Shekhar's claims and contended before the court that the petition was scandalous and filed only to defame him. The High Court has since ordered DNA test (which was not available to Solomon) of Tiwari which he is refusing to submit to.

In contrast, another ex-governor, from California, USA (retired with honour) and ex-actor, Arnold Schwarzenneneger (63) had admitted, in May 2011, that he had fathered a son, and supported, Joseph Baena, with the family’s housemaid in 1997 – resulting in filing for divorce by his wife, Maria Shriver, of the famous Kennedy clan. Incidentally, Tiwari’s wife having died a few years ago, he is not risking any divorce threat!

 
John B Monteiro, author and journalist, is editor of his website www.welcometoreason.com (Interactive Cerebral Challenger – with provision for instant response)