Meaningful Contact With Both Parents Integral For Child’s Welfare: Supreme Court Sets Custody Arrangement For Father Working Overseas
The Appeal before the Supreme Court challenged the judgment directing the father to continue moving a fresh application each time he visited India for overnight access to his minor daughter.
Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Sandeep Mehta, Supreme Court
While ordering that the father working overseas would have custody of his daughter over the weekends when he visits India, the Supreme Court has observed that meaningful contact with both parents is an integral component for the child’s welfare.
The Appeal before the Apex Court was filed against the judgment of the Kerala High Court declining to set aside an interim-custody arrangement made by the Family Court and directing the appellant–father to continue moving a fresh application each time he visited India for overnight access to his minor daughter.
The Division Bench of Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Sandeep Mehta said, “Meaningful contact with both parents is an integral component for the child’s welfare. We believe that where a non-custodial parent demonstrates consistency to be with the child, pays maintenance, and arranges his professional life around the child’s calendar, as the appellant has done in the present case, procedure ought not to stand in the way of a predictable schedule.”
Factual Background
The parties were married in the year 2016. The appellant is a graduate engineer who has spent most of his career on rotational overseas assignments, returning to India during scheduled breaks. The respondent-mother, a homemaker, resided with the child at Ernakulam. Their daughter was born in 2017. Following marital discord, the respondent left the matrimonial home with the child, and since then, the child has remained exclusively in her care. The appellant instituted a Petition before the Family Court seeking permanent custody of the child. Pending that petition, he filed applications for interim visitations.
The Family Court observed that as and when the petitioner is available here, he might make a necessary application for getting overnight custody. Contending that the “apply-each-time” arrangement of the Family Court caused uncertainty and loss of leave, the appellant approached the High Court praying for a definitive interim schedule not exceeding fifty per cent of the child’s vacations and all weekends when he is in India, together with continued daily video calls. The High Court dismissed the petition but, by way of ad hoc relief, directed interim custody for a few days with freedom for the mother to interact telephonically during the child’s stay with the father. Aggrieved thereby, the appellant father approached the Apex Court.
Reasoning
On a perusal of the facts of the case, the Bench said, “...we are persuaded that the arrangement devised by the Family Court, requiring the appellant to file a fresh IA on every visit to India, places an undue procedural burden on both the father and, by necessary implication, the minor child. Custody litigation at Family Court generally proceeds at a measured pace and compelling repetitive applications for what is, in essence, the same relief reduces the child’s time, exhausts the father’s limited leave, and invites avoidable conflict at every turn.”
The Bench thus considered it just and equitable to replace the Family Court’s arrangement with a standing interim arrangement that balanced stability with the appellant’s right to regular contact. We have taken into account the child’s tender age, her schooling in Ernakulam, the appellant’s rotational employment abroad, and the need to minimize travel and handovers. "...the child cannot be left to the vagaries of piecemeal orders. A structured timetable, sensitive to her routine and the appellant’s overseas posting, is thus imperative", it said.
Allowing the appeal in part, the Bench ordered, “Whenever the appellant is in India for at least 7 consecutive days, he shall be entitled to custody of the child from 10 a.m. on the first Saturday of that stay until 5 p.m. on the following Sunday, and, if his stay exceeds a further week, for the alternate weekend on the same timings.”
The Bench further directed that the each vacation shall be divided into two contiguous blocks of equal days for the custody. “No fresh IAs before the Family Court shall be required for the subsequent visitation periods for the appellant”, it ordered.
Cause Title: A v. B (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 709)