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No. In an order dated 19 August 2026, the Delhi High Court held that a father cannot be made liable under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (DV Act) merely because he failed to control his adult son. The Court dismissed a challenge to removing the father-in-law from the proceedings, finding that the specific allegations against him did not disclose domestic violence by him. Proceedings against the husband were left unaffected.
What the Delhi High Court decided
In Smt. Deepali Mahajani v. State Through Chief Secretary & Ors., CRL.M.C. 6388/2023, Justice Madhu Jain considered whether the pleaded facts justified issuing notice to the petitioner’s father-in-law under the DV Act. The Court dismissed her petition challenging an appellate order that had set aside the Magistrate’s direction to issue that notice.
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The ruling was specific to the allegations against this respondent. The Court did not find that the petitioner’s allegations were false; it assessed whether the facts as stated amounted to domestic violence by the father-in-law. It also did not decide the merits of the proceedings against her husband, which remained unaffected.
How the case reached the High Court
The petitioner, Smt. Deepali Mahajani, married respondent No. 3 in 2006. She lived with her husband and his father in Vasant Kunj, New Delhi, and the couple adopted a daughter in 2012. The order also describes connected business arrangements: the father-in-law ran a sole proprietorship, while the petitioner and her husband were partners in a separate enterprise that operated from the father’s business office and used its domain and email facilities. The parties disputed the businesses’ relationship and expenditure arrangements.
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On 27 January 2020, a Metropolitan Magistrate directed that notice be issued to the father-in-law under the DV Act. On 8 June 2023, an appellate court set that direction aside. Mahajani then invoked Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, to challenge the appellate order before the Delhi High Court. The High Court dismissed her petition on 19 August 2026.
What was alleged against the father-in-law
The application attributed several acts to him. It alleged that he failed to act against his son over the son’s alleged involvement with another woman; required the couple’s enterprise to vacate his business office; discontinued the petitioner’s business email facility; told the petitioner, her husband and their daughter to leave the matrimonial home; and threatened to take over or wind up the enterprise. The application also described him as dominating, orthodox and verbally abusive. The father-in-law and husband disputed the allegations, characterizing the dispute involving the father-in-law as commercial and the matrimonial dispute as one between the spouses.
Why the allegations did not establish domestic violence by him
Failing to control an adult son
The Court found no participation by the father-in-law in the alleged matrimonial misconduct. It stated: “A father cannot be made liable under the DV Act merely because he did not control the conduct of his adult son.” The alleged conduct of the husband, by itself, did not establish conduct by the father-in-law.
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Office, business domain and email access
The Court did not adopt a categorical rule that a commercial dispute can never fall under Section 3 of the DV Act. Instead, it considered whether the application connected the alleged loss of office access or business facilities to a resource protected by the Act. The application did not state that the petitioner had a right under law, custom, necessity or the domestic relationship to use the father-in-law’s office premises or facilities. Nor did it explain how the alleged threat to take over or wind up the enterprise would affect her partnership rights.
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The Court did not rely on the father-in-law’s disputed defence that he had only permitted access and withdrew it after alleged misuse. Its reasoning turned on what the application itself pleaded and how those facts related to the Act.
Alleged threat concerning the shared household
The order recognizes that the right to reside in a shared household does not depend on title, and that actual dispossession is not required if a threat of dispossession is made out. But the application, as described by the Court, did not identify a consequence threatened or a concrete step to remove the petitioner, prevent her access or disturb her possession. She continued to reside in the shared household. Taken together, the specific allegations did not show a threat of domestic violence by the father-in-law.
Insults, shouting and verbal abuse
The application used terms such as “insulted,” “shouted” and “abused,” but did not set out what was said or explain how an incident caused mental harm or amounted to insult, ridicule, humiliation or threat under Section 3. The Court said: “The words ‘insulted’, ‘shouted’ and ‘abused’ are conclusions. Without the facts underlying them, they do not make out verbal or emotional abuse under Section 3.” This was a conclusion about the lack of particulars in this application, not a ruling that insults can never qualify as verbal or emotional abuse.
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A court deciding whether to issue notice does not determine whether an allegation is true or weigh evidence. It can, however, examine whether the facts stated in the application, without adding to them, amount to domestic violence. Justice Jain described that review this way: “At the stage of notice, the Court cannot decide whether an allegation is true or weigh the evidence. It may, however, see whether the facts stated in the application, without adding to them, amount to domestic violence as this is not a mini-trial.”
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That distinction matters: the decision did not authorize a court to resolve contested evidence prematurely. It held that the pleaded acts in this case did not make out domestic violence by this particular respondent.
Quick Recap
What the ruling does—and does not—mean
- It means: A father-in-law is not liable under the DV Act merely for failing to control an adult son. Alleged acts must be attributable to the particular respondent and, on the pleaded facts, amount to domestic violence.
- It does not mean: Fathers-in-law have blanket immunity from DV Act proceedings, or that business disputes are automatically outside Section 3. The specific facts and their connection to rights or resources protected by the Act matter.
- It does not decide: Whether the husband committed the alleged matrimonial misconduct, the petitioner’s business rights in separate proceedings, or the merits of the continuing proceedings against the husband.
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