mumbai a sobo couple that has been living in the same flat albeit in two separate partitioned portions of the house will have to continue with that arrangement the bombay high court recently rejected geeta merchants plea for restoration of conjugal rights but at the same time also dismissed her husband feroze merchants petition for divorce on grounds of cruelty a division bench of justice abhay oka and justice a s chandurkar has observed that the marital relations had completely broken down but no divorce could be granted under the law in fact looking at the evidence on record this is a case of irretrievable breakdown of marriage but the law laid down by the supreme court is very clear that unless a case for grant of divorce on the grounds provided under the law is made out this court cannot dissolve the marriage said the judges who had unsuccessfully tried to make the couple resolve their differences indian laws allow for divorce only for a few reasons including adultery cruelty desertion spouse converting to another religion schizophrenia incurable diseases and presumption of death geeta had asked the court that other than maintenance feroze should be asked to restore her membership in top clubs including the bombay gymkhana the court said since the divorce plea had been rejected it could not grant the order for maintenance the hc though said the family court order asking feroze to pay rs 20000 as maintenance to geeta and restoring her club memberships would continue for six weeks to allow her to file appropriate proceedings in court geeta and feroze had married in 1976 and have two daughters according to geeta after 22 years of a happily married life the relationship between the couple deteriorated as her husband got involved with another woman geeta claimed he started spending his weekends and holidays with the woman and in 1999 got the flat in colaba where they were staying partitioned geeta in 2001 approached the court feroze also filed a petition seeking divorce he claimed his wife was a chain smoker part of the cocktail circuit would not look after their daughters and was suspicious of his relations with women the trial court ordered restoration of conjugal rights and dismissed the petition for divorce feroze then filed appeals in high court despite ferozes denials the hc pointed to his taking holidays with the other woman transferring money to her and even printing her name in the younger daughters wedding card there is a great deal of substance in the allegation made by the wife regarding an illicit relationship between the husband and the other woman said the hc while disbelieving his claims of cruelty the court though also said the evidence did not show that geeta had made much effort to reconcile and quashed the trial courts order of restoration of conjugal rights names changed