Article 165 of the Turkish Civil Code regulates divorce proceedings due to mental illness. “If one of the spouses is mentally ill and therefore the joint life becomes unbearable for the other spouse, this spouse can file a divorce case, provided that it is determined by the official health board report that this disease cannot be cured.”
If the mental illness that is the reason for the divorce is a mental illness that prevents marriage, it must have emerged after the marriage. Mental illness before marriage is one of the definite barriers to marriage. Despite this, if the marriage has taken place, this marriage is void with absolute nullity.
In order for one of the spouses to file for divorce based on mental illness, the other spouse must be mentally ill. The Civil Code has counted only mental illness as the reason for divorce, not all kinds of illness, and although there are serious illnesses with no hope of recovery, a divorce case cannot be filed based on diseases such as epilepsy, leprosy, syphilis, plague and AIDS.
In order for a divorce case to be filed on the basis of a mental illness, there must be no possibility of recovery from the mental illness. If there is a possibility of recovery from the disease, the judge will not decide on divorce and will reject the case.
One of the important conditions in a divorce case due to mental illness is to prove that the common life has become unbearable. Although mental illness has been proven with an official medical board report, the judge does not immediately decide to divorce. The issue that needs to be investigated is whether the common life has become unbearable.
JUDICIARY 2nd LAW OFFICE 2004/4941 E. 2004/7899 K. 15.06.2004 T.
“… It is understood that the defendant suffers from “temporal type epilepsy (epilepsy)”. The presence of this disease in one of the spouses is not a reason for divorce in itself. There is no evidence that the defendant abstained from the treatment of his illness, and it was also determined in the report that he had the psychological competence to carry out the marriage. Except for the defendant’s epilepsy, the existence of any other concrete event that would shake the foundation of the marriage union and not allow the continuation of the common life has been revealed. In that case, it was not considered correct to decide to divorce in writing when the case should be rejected. ”’