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Ch 8. Things to do - Evidence, Story, CrPC 91, Show expenses

Write the story, Collect the evidence

First thing we need to do when we expect cases from wife is to write down and document that have happened since marriage, and continue to update it as time passes by. Yes, this seemingly boring exercise may save you thousands and lakhs of rupees one day!

Doing this exercise has lot more benefits than the possible tangible ones on one's future bank balance. Writing things down can also work as an emotional catharsis and a release of baggage, so one tends to disassociate from the negative experiences, rather than holding them inside.

Write the story

1. Write complete details and sequence of events which happened from time of engagement, wedding, honeymoon etc, after marriage, till wife left. If she had left several times and came back, then write all those into a computer document or a large notebook if you don't use computer much.

2. Try to be specific with dates and times. If you don't remember the time, then mention the approximate time of day, for example "In morning we went to restaurant at XYZ place". If you have the bill of the restaurant, then that will go into the evidence basket.

Above may seem more relevant for dealing with other cases than maintenance. Nevertheless, I would advice everyone to write these things anyway, when you suspect wife is going to file more cases, which usually they do when they know you are in fighting than compromising mood.

1. Main reason is simply that human memory is not perfect, and we tend to forget things and details with passage of time. If your wife has left 6 months back and you are waiting for what will happen next, you may tend to think that let's wait and watch and then take next steps. Which is a correct approach actually. But if she files a DV case 1 year after leaving you, you will have to scramble and start preparing a response to her petition. Many events may slip from your memory with the result that your objection will seem reasonable but will lack the flow or details which can make it into a compelling story.

2. You write the points once, and the same can be used whenever required in any case she may file in future. It sounds very business-like, but it works!

3. Also, most of the allegations and stories made by wives are actually created by lazy-minded divorce lawyers who copy paste things from one client's petition to another. One look at them can reveal inconsistencies, contradictions, and there are hardly any precise statement about dates and times of events. If you think your lawyer is not good, I would say that your wife's lawyer will be worse! They are just riding on the waves of women empowerment till the waves last. When you draft your objection to wife's petition with chronological and precise details of events, it will be very clear to the judge as to which party is more dependable in this case. All these statements can easily be converted into the evidence affidavit at the time of filing evidence, and preparing evidence will seem like a breeze to that time.

4. Having same points in your evidence affidavit as in your previous written statement/objections will give your story lot more credence. Many wives' petition and evidence affidavits are quite different, because they know that no one can file a perjury case on them based on statements in petition. So at the time of evidence, they will produce an affidavit with toned down allegations or some of them may be completely removed too. If your objections and evidence affidavit are mostly same, then this also can be used as a point in arguments that wife had made wild allegations in petition but changed her statements in the evidence affidavit.

Collect the evidence

1. As you write the story mentioned above, for each event in the story, try to think if you have any documentary evidence for that. As an example, I mentioned earlier about a restaurant bill. Keep collecting all such evidences and start filing them in chronological or reverse-chronological order in a file. For electronic evidences like PDF bank statement, computer screenshots etc, you can maintain them in folders and files on computer, or use productivity tools like Evernote to organize them even better.

2. Collect all photographs of wedding, honeymoon etc, other photographs of ceremonies, visits to any places with wife. When wife says in her petition or affidavit: "I was not given food", you can show those cheery pictures of your honeymoon to her during her cross-exam to ask why her cheeks were so rosy and plump if she was starving all the time!

3. Also collect any videos.

4. Get copies of all bank statements, credit card statements of your own. Get wife's too if you can.

5. Keep record of all SMS. Use a software to backup the SMS since old SMS may get deleted on some phones.

6. Keep record of phone calls on the phone or get itemized billing of calls from phone company. There are software available which can keep backup of unlimited number of calls.

7. Keep all receipts especially cash receipts since there won't be any other record of cash purchases.

8. Start to record phone conversations etc from now onwards at least if someone from wife's party is still in touch with you.

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