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Source: The post is based on the article “No Bar of Res-judicata on Second Petition for Divorce If It Is Founded on New Facts: Madras HC” published in News18 on 7th February 2023.
What is the News?
Madras High Court has recently dismissed a civil revision petition filed by a woman against an order of a lower court that had allowed a second divorce petition filed by her husband.
The lower court had dismissed the women’s petition filed for rejection of her husband’s second divorce petition on the ground of res-judicata.
What is res-judicata?
Res judicata literally means ‘the thing has been judged”.
The principle of res judicata is applied when a litigant attempts to file a subsequent lawsuit on the same matter after having received a judgment in a previous case involving the same parties.
It is a judicial concept which means that the issue before the court has already been decided by another court, between the same parties. Therefore, the prior court will dismiss the case before it as being useless.
Res Judicata as a concept is applicable both in case of Civil as well as Criminal cases.
The courts apply the Res Judicata doctrine to 1) preserve the effect of the first judgment, 2) prevent injustice to the parties of a case supposedly finished and 3) avoid unnecessary waste of resources and time of the Judicial System.
