APCP

Promote Alternative Dispute Resolution in family discords.

"Matters of the family" which can be repaired must be mediated and settled by sewing and patchwork.

Marriage Relationship Counseling is a specialized area requiring impetus to solve the new generation ills and save families. Today, the nuclear Indian family is plagued by new generation ills, Forced marriages, honour killings, live-in relationships, parental child removal, inter-country adoptions and surrogacy defy solutions in codified law. Conventional family law framers never visualized these societal complexities which have mushroomed recently. The statutory law has not caught up with the maze of intricacies which dog these family law issues. Provisions for settlement of disputes outside the court find a prominent place in the Civil Procedure Code, the Codified Marriage Laws and the Family Courts Act. However, settlement, reconciliation and mediation in family law matters are largely un-utilised. Upholding the salutary provisions to endeavour reconciliation in the first instance, the Supreme Court in the Jagraj Singh vs. Birpal Kaur case (2007) clearly confirms that settlement efforts in matrimonial matters are not an empty, meaningless ritual. Matters of the family which can be repaired must be mediated and settled by sewing and patchwork. Human relationships must be bonded by settlement and, as far as possible, not litigated in Court. Spouses, Parents and families need to realize the advantages of ADR (alternative dispute resolution) in the family structure. Matrimonial relief carved out of settlement will serve better than the results obtained by adversarial litigation involving time, effort, finances, and above all, breaking up of a family.

Issues of marriage, divorce and children ought to be put before family courts. Trained counselors, mediators and advisers should resolve them mutually. A unanimous consensus saves a home, a family and a societal foundation. Thus there is excellent scope for the trained Counsellors and other connected professionals to enter in this area of mediation and settlement in marital counseling.

APCP aims to develop trained counselors and mediators in this field to deliver lasting family solutions.

Litigation – whether divorce, maintenance, alimony, child custody or any other matrimonial cause – should not be viewed in terms of failure or success of legal action. The amicable settlement of family conflicts is a social therapeutic problem needing much attention from the society and hence it becomes one of our main aim and objectives.