Why mutual consent does not mean an instant divorce for couples in India

A marriage does not always end with a slammed door. More often, it ends the way most important things end, gradually, and then administratively. Two people stop making plans together. One takes a job in another city; the other stays back because the children have just started school. The home loan continues to be paid in joint names. Family functions continue to be attended, and questions about the other continue to be answered, long after the marriage itself has quietly become an arrangement rather than a relationship.By the time the word divorce is finally spoken aloud, the harder question has usually stopped being whether the marriage is over. It has become what to do with everything that was built around it.Who keeps the house. Who pays the school fees. Where the children spend their weekends.