No video calls with sons, Gujarat court tells estranged dad

VADODARA: Spending too much time on smart phones for video conferences is not good for children. This is what the court observed while dismissing an estranged father’s plea to talk to his two sons via video calling facility last Friday. Udaipur resident 46-year-old Vikram Singh (name changed), who is separated from his wife, approached the district court with an unusual request to be allowed to have 30 minutes each virtual meeting with both sons through video calling daily.
Singh’s teenage sons, aged 16 and 13 years live with their mother, 44-year-old Shruti (name changed), in Vadodara. Earlier, the court had allowed him to meet them once in a month for three hours in court premises. But he has not been able to meet them since February. He also said he could not travel owing to restrictions during the lockdown and now because of the increasing number of Covid-19 cases.
However, the court of additional sessions judge H I Bhatt rejected his plea. In its order, the court said it is not in the interest of minor kids that they spend more time on smartphones and on video conferences as they are already getting online education in the present situation.
The court also observed that the estranged father had failed to establish the urgency in the matter. The lower courts have been asked by the Gujarat high court to take up only urgent cases for hearing.
In his petition, Singh had also told the court that a child’s human rights have to be protected and daily contact with the non-custodial parent should be granted by default.
“We put forth our point that the applicant wants to meet his children. However, why did he not pay the maintenance amount for those same children throughout the entire lockdown? Also, he has often made attempts to instigate the kids against their mother and the kids too did not want to meet him due to his conduct,” said Shruti’s advocate Niraj Jain.