The Andhra Pradesh High Court has dismissed a habeas corpus petition filed by a woman seeking custody of her two minor sons from her ex-husband, fining her Rs 50,000 for withholding a prior settlement agreement from the court.
A division bench consisting of Justice Ravi Nath Tilhari and Justice Purushottam Kumar Chintalapudi determined on July 28 that the children were not in illegal confinement, as the mother had previously consented to surrender her custody rights to the father. The bench noted that the petitioner had engaged in misuse of the judicial process by suppressing critical information, which unnecessarily triggered state action based on her misrepresentations.
The court directed the mother to pay the Rs 50,000 penalty to the Registrar (Judicial) within three weeks. The funds will be placed into fixed deposits at a nationalised bank, split equally with Rs 25,000 allocated for each child, to be paid out when they reach legal adulthood.
Terms of the Mutual Settlement
The case originated from a representation the woman submitted to the Chief Justice on June 28, in which she claimed her husband had absconded with their children and that their location was unknown. However, state representatives revealed to the court that the couple had signed a Memorandum of Understanding on March 26, 2025.
The agreement set out conditions for dissolving their marriage by mutual consent and included a Rs 10 lakh financial package alongside monthly payments of Rs 30,000 for 12 months spanning June 2025 to May 2026. The terms explicitly assigned complete care and custody of both boys to the husband, barring the wife from asserting future custody claims.
Previous Judicial Proceedings
The settlement agreement had also featured in an earlier matter before the Telangana High Court. On September 18, 2025, that court cited the document while quashing first information report proceedings involving the husband and another co-accused.
Following the mother’s petition, the Andhra Pradesh High Court issued an order on July 23 directing authorities to locate and produce the children, while naming the father as a respondent and incorporating both the Telangana High Court order and the March 26, 2025 agreement into the case record.
Court Appearance and Rejection of Apology
During the hearing on July 28, the father, his mother, and the two minor children appeared before the bench. The petitioner initially stated she was fluent only in Telugu and could not read English. After the court arranged legal assistance, she read the settlement agreement in English in the presence of her legal aid counsel.
When questioned about omitting the agreement and the September 18, 2025 Telangana High Court ruling from her filing, she claimed she had considered them irrelevant. She also confirmed to the court that she had already received Rs 5 lakh from her husband under the settlement terms.
Holding that the petition was submitted without disclosing essential facts, the bench declined to accept an apology tendered by the woman after the judgment, stating that her conduct did not warrant forgiveness.
