Can a single Supreme Court judge grant divorce? This case says maybe not.

A husband and wife agreed on everything. But when they asked a single Supreme Court judge to approve their divorce, he said—he could not decide alone.

When the judge stopped the hearing

The wife and husband walked into the Supreme Court together. They carried a Settlement Agreement dated 27th October 2021, its pages crisp and neatly stapled. Both wanted out of the marriage. Both had agreed on how to split what they had. Both wanted a divorce by mutual consent. The single judge on the bench — Justice Krishna Murari — looked at them, looked at their papers, and stopped the proceeding. Not because the settlement was unfair. Not because someone was being forced. But because of a question that no single judge of the Supreme Court could answer alone. The courtroom fell into a waiting silence as the judge set down the file.

The case before him was Anamika Varun Rathore @ Anamika Singh Bhadouria v. Varun Pratap Singh Rathore, registered as Transfer Petition (Civil) No. 1378/2018. The citation was 2022 LiveLaw (SC) 125. The date was 1st February 2022.

The question that would not fit one bench

The couple had invoked Article 142 of the Constitution — the Supreme Court's extraordinary power to pass any order necessary to do "complete justice" in a case before it. This power is vast. The Supreme Court has used it to dissolve marriages, settle property disputes, even override statutory bars when the facts demand it. But here, the single judge saw a problem he could not solve by himself.

The question was simple on its face: Can a single judge of the Supreme Court grant a divorce decree under Article 142 based on a settlement agreement?

Beneath it lies a deeper question about the limits of judicial power, the structure of the Supreme Court, and what happens when two consenting adults want out of a marriage but the law's machinery does not quite fit their case.

The precedent that blocked the path

The Supreme Court usually hears cases in benches of two or three judges. Single judges handle specific categories — transfer petitions (requests to move a case from one court to another), certain criminal appeals, and miscellaneous matters. But granting a divorce is not a procedural step. It is a substantive order that changes the legal status of two people permanently.

The couple's lawyer argued that Article 142 gives the Supreme Court the power to do whatever is necessary to do complete justice. If both parties agree, why should a single judge not approve the divorce?

The court noted that the same question had been flagged in an earlier case — Transfer Petition (Civil) No. 908 of 2019, decided on 1st March 2021. In that case, a single judge had referred the question to a larger bench. That reference was still pending. No one had answered it yet. The order in that earlier petition had specifically directed that the question of whether a single judge could grant a divorce decree under Article 142 be adjudicated by a larger bench, and until that answer came, no single judge could proceed.

Justice Krishna Murari looked at the couple's settlement agreement, the paper lying flat on his desk. He looked at the pending reference. Then he did something that must have felt deeply unsatisfying to the husband and wife standing before him: he refused to decide. The weight of the unresolved question hung in the air.

The order that left them married

The judge did not dismiss the couple's petition. He did not say their settlement was invalid. He simply said: I cannot decide this alone.

His order directed that the matter be placed before the Chief Justice of India for constituting an "appropriate bench" — meaning a larger bench of two or more judges who could finally answer the question that had been hanging since March 2021. The single judge's reasoning was precise: the question whether a single judge can grant a divorce decree under Article 142 on the basis of a settlement agreement "requires adjudication by a larger bench and cannot be decided by a single judge."

In other words, the very act of deciding whether he had the power to grant the divorce would itself require a decision he was not authorised to make. It was a jurisdictional paradox — and the only way out was to send the question up the chain.

What Article 142 actually says

Article 142 of the Constitution says that the Supreme Court may pass "such decree or order as is necessary for doing complete justice in any cause or matter pending before it." The phrase "complete justice" is deliberately broad. The Supreme Court has used it to fill gaps in the law, to remedy injustices that no statute addresses, and to dissolve marriages where the mandatory six-month waiting period for mutual consent divorce would cause undue hardship.

But Article 142 has limits. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that it cannot override express statutory provisions or fundamental rights. The question in this case was whether a single judge — as opposed to a division bench (a bench of two or more judges) — can exercise this power for something as consequential as dissolving a marriage. The answer, the court suggested, is not obvious.

If a single judge can grant a divorce under Article 142, then every transfer petition (a request to move a case from one court to another) involving a matrimonial dispute could potentially end in a divorce decree from a single judge. That would be a significant expansion of the power of single-judge benches — and it would bypass the usual requirement that divorce cases be heard by at least two judges when they reach the Supreme Court.

The case number itself — Transfer Petition (Civil) No. 1378/2018 — tells part of the story. This was originally a petition to transfer proceedings from one court to another, a routine procedural matter. But the couple had used this procedural vehicle to seek a substantive divorce decree. The single judge, hearing what was nominally a transfer petition, was being asked to do far more than move a case from one court to another. He was being asked to end a marriage.

The wait begins

For the wife and husband, the immediate outcome is delay. Their settlement agreement is valid. Their mutual consent is clear. But they cannot get their divorce until a larger bench decides whether a single judge has the power to grant it. That larger bench has not yet been constituted. The Chief Justice of India will have to decide which judges will hear the question, and when.

In the meantime, the couple remains married — legally, if not in fact. Their settlement agreement sits in the court file, waiting for a judicial answer to a question that should have been simple but turned out to be anything but.

What hangs on the answer

This is not just about this one couple. It is about every couple who reaches a settlement and approaches the Supreme Court for a quick divorce under Article 142. The Supreme Court has been encouraging settlements in matrimonial disputes. It has used Article 142 to grant divorces where the parties agree and the waiting period under the Hindu Marriage Act would cause hardship. But if the power to do so rests only with division benches — and not single judges — then hundreds of pending transfer petitions could be affected.

The larger bench will have to decide: does a single judge of the Supreme Court have the power to grant a divorce decree under Article 142? The answer will shape how matrimonial disputes are resolved at the highest level of the Indian judiciary. It will determine whether the Supreme Court's single-judge benches can offer a fast-track exit to consenting couples — or whether those couples must wait for a larger bench to hear their case.

THE QUESTION: Until a larger bench decides, no single judge of the Supreme Court can grant a divorce under Article 142 based on a settlement agreement — even if both parties consent.

The couple agreed on everything. The court agreed on nothing — except that it needed more judges to decide. The settlement agreement, signed and dated, remains in the file, waiting.