Andhra Pradesh High Court has dissolved a marriage of over five decades between an elderly couple who had been living separately for 49 years, waiving the mandatory six-month cooling off period under the Hindu Marriage Act and observing that Hindu marriage has shifted from being an indissoluble sacrament to a contractual agreement.
The ruling was pronounced on 13 August 2026 by a division bench of Justice Battu Devanand and Justice Sunitha Gandham at the High Court of Andhra Pradesh in Amaravati.