British citizens-divorce petition in india

[ssmerugu]

Hi
I would be grateful if anyone can shed light on this issue please. My husband and I are both British citizens, my husband acquired the citizenship through me. we got married 10 years ago in India and since he got his citizenship 7 years ago he was looking for ways to get rid of me and when I got pregnant he abandoned me 7 months through my pregnancy without informing me about his address or whereabouts. When I had the baby I wanted to take the baby to India to show the baby to my in laws and I had got the visa to travel to India with great difficulty as the law requires the other parent's consent to travel abroad but he was not getting in touch with me. So I had to get a document sworn and got a tourist visa for 3 months to visit India. When I wanted to come back to the UK with my baby the foreign office refused to give me an exit letter as I had overstayed my visit in india. They asked me for a consent letter from my husband for our child to travel back to the UK with me. I found out that my husband was in india at the time so after failing to get him to contact me i approached the local police to get my husband to give the letter and he did this process took 2 years so my son and I were stuck in india for 2 years just to get a consent letter from my husband.
When my husband abandoned me in the UK he took all the important documents with him including our marriage certificate and all the photographs .
After he had given the consent letter 10 days later before I was preparing to travel back to the UK he filed for a divorce petition in india. I attended the hearings a few times and came back home to the UK ever since he has been harassing me by sending summons to attend the divorce case in India. I had appointed a family member as my GPA and the court does not seem to understand that I cannot travel to India without my husband willing to give a consent letter for our son to get a visa to go to India
He has not paid a penny in child maintenance and called the child maintenance office and told them that he is living abroad for over 2 years and earning less than £7 per week
Now my solicitor in india tells me that he can't file a maintenance case for me unless I am there in person. Please can anyone one give me some info regarding my problem.

[CR001]

This is not an immigration matter. You will need to speak to a family law practitioner for assistance.

[settledintheuk]

I hear you sister. My full sympathy for being caught in Indian legal system. Your misery just started. Have been there seen that. Manage to get out that rotten judiciary system. It's worst than hell. As far as divorce is concerned he can't get it easily if you don't want to agree. It's almost impossible to get a divorce in India unless both parties agree. Get a good lawyer and hope you are rich? If not then life will suck more. Just remember if he is after you and wants to make you suffer more than don't go to India. Since you are British citizen and so is your husband then why the hell Indian court has to hear your divorce case? Because you married in India? talk to that. Law of the land applies. You are not no longer Indian and no longer live there then court has no jurisdiction. You can tell your lawyer to request court to quash the case sighting above reason. At the end of all these try to resolve the issue out of court.

[secret.simon]

Also see similar thread of dissolving a marriage contracted in Pakistan through divorce proceedings in the UK.

You may wish to contact a family law practioner in the UK, as CR001 has already advised.