On the other side of 498a

Today, I think I’ve stumbled upon the starkest truth of the life. When you think that the problems of your life are overwhelming, God brings someone who is little bit worse than you and that somehow nudges you to become human to that person.

Truth be told, I am not a 498a victim.
Truth be told, I am a fake, an impostor amongst you all 498a victims.
Truth be told, I am probably the only one who escaped the direct wrath of 498a due to efforts of those that were little ahead of me.

But Beware that my confessions above do not mean that I have not seen the wrath of feminist laws break my life apart.

Perhaps, I have borne the brunt from a far better oiled machine called Australian Family Law and still is able to talk about it. I still shiver when I think that Indian laws are being modified only to ape Western Laws and when we, as SIFIANs in our naivety for unknown are asking Government to implement what was successful in West. Maybe we need to think far beyond.


Back in 2005 when the dark clouds of divorce had zoomed into my clear blue marital sky, I was in serious double minds to come to India to keep myself relatively dry. My parents wanted me to come but something deep down inside me was making me hesitate

Yes, Thoughts of leaving my very young son behind was hard too.

Perhaps the external manifestation of hesitation was a friend of my X who used to call me her brother and asked me to go to India as soon as possible. I also knew that the same lady also used to call my X within next 10 minutes. Other than that, my so called friend and sister was a very GOD fearing devotee running a temple as its President.

Thus plagued by GO-NO GO State, I boarded a local tram in Melbourne. I did not realize that my X was also in a same tram until I heard her voice. I could make out instantly that she was talking to her sister in India.

I heard her instruct her sister to wait for few more days and file documents only after she informs her that He has left. Although she did not use my name, I felt that I could be THE THIRD PARTY referred to in that call.

I dug on internet what she could file against me and discovered SIF and was introduced to 498a. I stayed up next 10 nights reading the horror stores posted on internet and poetic metaphors of the guys.

I could see that even amongst all the pain, many of the Guys were poetic.

Thus, the KaviSammelan came into existence. I have been reading a lot and writing even more (majority of which is beyond nonsense) in SIF since then.

That is what makes me SIF member.

I am one who shares your angst without having gone through the exact same pain. Viewed just little differently, I am the only Non criminal Indian who likes to hang out with you all those law of the land considers criminal types HA HA! Maybe I have become a genuinely Confused Desi without being born in America.

The point that I can never ignore is that those who wrote before me saved me from the trouble on Indian side.

It is not that I did not suffer. I have paid the same prices that you’ve paid.

On the other side of the pond, I had to face the problem mostly alone. I used to find myself alone especially at all the pivotal moments. There was no dearth of friends who rushed to me with band-aids once the pivotal moment had come and gone. But not one person (including lawyers) stood with me during the actual firings. No one except maybe few SIF statements (in my own voice) making noise in my head.

If quoted in financial terms, amounts look huge in Rupees but it is all relative. In reality it is only about 10 years of my wasted efforts in making something out of myself. If I really compress time, it is only efforts of about 5 best years of my career.

As for my successes in Australia.

I have managed to prove in Australian Court that my X lies. In fact, I made them say it in their decision over which they deliberated behind closed door for approximately 9 months. I made them say it in writing four times that she lied to them under oath and they had been able to catch her and detect where she lied to them.

I proved in court that my X is domestically violent and breaking the orders that they made about 8 times.

All such efforts total upto 27 separate instances of proven guilty in period of under 2 years.

I made them agree with my allegations that my X robbed the very hands of the Australian Government that were literally feeding her besides me.

I lived through Shared Parenting program for 3 years from 1.5 year old boy to 4.5 year
old boy. Unless asleep, my son loved to dash into me running.

I took my son to the temple that X hated to her bones. I was rewarded when my son played the role of Krishna in my house to cajole me into reading stories for him

I took my son to every single Children's Park out their in Melbourne. Parks there are really beautiful and worth every minute I’ve spent there.

I took him to every single place that I discovered and felt he might like. I took videos of him as often as I could. I have captured him on videos him becoming a boy playing in dirt and grass once again from a scared kid locked up indoors by his mom in those 3 nights.

But I could not continue to do it any more. Seeing him every fortnight to me was like starving for 11 nights and overeating for 3. I could not go on dropping him back to her knowing I would not see him on that night.

Shared Parenting may work for the child but it still wreaks havoc on life of the non custodial parent.

In my failures, there are too many to count.

I lost custody applications of my son twice in Australia and once hung up in India.

I wrote an Affidavit of about 46 pages, on its last page, in one paragraph, I had written a statement about many fathers being separated from their children by force. I had written an in definitive word "many" instead of a number such as 50,000 or 30,000. Magistrate picked up on that so called legal error.

PRICE I PAID for that word "MANY": My custody Application was dismissed in 2 minutes of the hearing.

I lost the house that I purchased that I discovered after unaccountable amount of driving. I lost my chance to enjoy the fruits that I had planted in its gardens.

My X stole money right from under me while living in my house and then shamelessly defended herself by lying to court that I had given her permission to rob, pillage and steal. I was wrong because I had later on changed my mind. She confessed she stole but added that I was blackmailing her. Oddly enough that defence mixed with sufficient amount of tears worked. The land of Australia let a woman who caused one of its largest banks to lose 9 million in lost revenues go scot-free.

Yes, I made mistakes through the separation. It was my first real one for crying out loud!. But was the Court in Australia blind?


Not one Australian bureaucrat has asked me for a bribe, not ever.

But that does not make them any better than Indian bureaucrats. I have had to hear those nazis yell and scream on me over the phone because I was asking them to do their job which they did not want to do.

One of them threw a paper weight from her desk on me. To this day, I will never forget look on her face as I picked it up and placed it back on my application and said "Concentrate on this, Instead". Reluctantly, she investigated.

It took them two more years and lot more writeups from me using which the Public body was able to find large stash of hidden income (twice bigger than my guess) and exactly where I told them it was hidden with name of X intact even after she tried very hard to remove it.

So what do those Australian bureaucrats do next? They bought a new carpet to sweep all of the great evidence under, clean up their hands after the sweep and say to me “LOOK MATE! WE FOUND NOTHING ON HER!”

I have heard the elected representative of Australian Federal Parliament tell me in her sweetest voice after reading through 50 page decision of the bureaucrats that no one in Australia can do anything for me.

The Family Law System is only supposed to work if the woman AND man are honest to each other. If one of them is dishonest, the system will not function!

Still I find myself falling short.

To this day, it sends shiver down my spine when I recollect all this.

That is not me. I am supposed to a non confrontational type Gujarati man from Mumbai who will run at the first sign of trouble.

I feel suicidal when I think of myself as a loser.

My mom wants me to get remarried. But She does not understand me. I am not the same person anymore. Her son is long gone and buried somewhere in past. She thinks I need to be married so that I have someone with me to look after my Son.

How can I get married again? Does such a woman exist? Is there a woman who will marry a man who may not be able to earn very well and still have to pay large chunk to his theiving X? Can there be any woman who can marry a man who can barely trust her? Is there even a point in talking about such a woman to any one?

The most important ingredients of marriages in Indian context for me is the "THE BLIND FAITH" in goodness of opposite gender. It is completely lacking in me. I am not going to be able to trust a woman even if my very life depends on it.

10 years ago, I had married a woman I thought I liked without bothering to know her nature as I could trust her as a person to a certain extent. I will get to know her over time was my thinking.

What the hell do I do with myself now?

What am I? How do I come out of this? When will this be over?

All I want to do is play with my son everyday before he becomes a man needing to shave twice a day. I may not be able to walk by myself then. Is that too much to ask?

Now, coming to the flash point that inspired this blog…

Today, a person who is member of SIF whom I doubted sometime ago shared with me a story of 60+ Old Couple struggling in the Indian Courts whose only son has committed suicide.