Supreme Court Rules on Child Custody Battles

Inserting a new scrutiny dimension to child custody legal battles between estranged parents, Supreme Court has ruled that courts must first evaluate mental and psychological conditions of each parent and assess their abilities to deal with growing needs of a child before deciding such disputes.

In application of the well-settled principle to serve “the best interest of the child’, courts, prior to awarding custody rights of a child, mandatorily interact with the child to understand with which parent his or her compatibility, comfort and cohesiveness is better.

Inserting “parents’ assessment principle” to bitterly fought court battles between estranged couples, a bench of Justices Sanjay Karol and N Kotiswar Singh Thursday said courts must not focus solely on the psychological test of a child but also that of the parents.

Writing the judgment, Justice N Kotiswar Singh said, “While it is important to make an assessment as to how a child will respond to either of the parents, it is equally important to ascertain mental and psychological conditions of the parents themselves to deal with the needs of the growing child.”

SC said the assessment of the parents’ psychological conditions must be conducted prior to a similar assessment of the child to understand compatibility with each of the parents.

SC referred to a 2025 study by Nimhans, Bengaluru, covering issues such as parent-child relationship and interaction, parental dynamics, parental mental health issues, malicious acts by parents, adjustment to changes in child’s life, issues in school context and child mental health issues.