Yes, but the route changes completely. Mutual consent under Section 13B needs both spouses. A contested divorce does not. What it needs instead is a recognised ground, and proof of it.
The trade-off you are making
A mutual consent divorce is short, cheap and predictable because nobody is contesting anything. A contested divorce is none of those things. You are now running a trial: pleadings, documents, examination and cross-examination of witnesses, arguments. Realistically that is years rather than months, and appeals extend it further.
What a contested petition actually looks like, stage by stage
It helps to see the whole road before you start down it. The petition goes to the Family Court, chosen under Section 19 of the Hindu Marriage Act from among the place of solemnisation, where the respondent resides, where you last resided together, where the wife resides if she is the petitioner, or where you reside if the respondent is abroad. In Bengaluru that is the Family Courts at Nyaya Degula, H. Siddaiah Road. From filing, the sequence is:
- Filing and numbering, then issue of notice or summons to the respondent.
- Written statement from the respondent, very often with a counter claim and almost always with an application for interim maintenance under Section 24 and, where there are children, an application about custody and access under Section 26.
- Reference to mediation, which in Bengaluru usually means the Karnataka Mediation Centre at Nyaya Degula. Section 23(2) of the Hindu Marriage Act and Section 9 of the Family Courts Act both require the court to attempt reconciliation, so this is not optional.
- Framing of issues, which fixes what actually has to be proved. Read the issues carefully; they decide what evidence is relevant for the rest of the case.
- Petitioner's evidence, ordinarily filed as an affidavit of examination in chief with the documents, followed by cross-examination.
- Respondent's evidence and cross-examination.
- Arguments and judgment.
The step by step guide on how to file for divorce in India sets out the documents each stage needs. Two timing points are worth knowing before you file at all: Section 14 bars a divorce petition within one year of the marriage except with the court's leave on grounds of exceptional hardship or exceptional depravity, and an appeal against a Family Court judgment lies to the High Court of Karnataka under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act within thirty days. Section 28 of the Hindu Marriage Act speaks of ninety days for decrees of a district court, and because the two periods differ, the safe course is to work to the shorter one.
You must plead a ground, not just unhappiness
Under Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act the grounds include cruelty, desertion for two years or more, adultery, conversion to another religion, the specified mental-disorder grounds, venereal disease in a communicable form, and renunciation of the world. Parallel provisions exist under the Special Marriage Act, the Indian Divorce Act and Muslim personal law. In practice, cruelty and desertion carry the overwhelming majority of contested petitions.
Mental cruelty is a well-developed head: sustained humiliation, false criminal complaints, refusal of conjugal relations without cause, and conduct that makes cohabitation genuinely intolerable have all been accepted. It is judged on the cumulative effect of conduct, not one incident.
Evidence decides it
The court cannot act on your account alone. Messages, emails, medical records, police complaints, witnesses, and a clear chronology are what convert an allegation into a finding. Start collecting before you file, not after.
Section 23 can defeat a good ground
Even where the ground is made out, Section 23 of the Hindu Marriage Act requires the court to be satisfied of several further things before it grants a decree. The petitioner must not be taking advantage of his or her own wrong. Where adultery is alleged, the petitioner must not have been accessory to it, connived at it or condoned it, and where cruelty is alleged, must not have condoned the cruelty. The petition must not be collusive, and there must be no unnecessary or improper delay in bringing it. In practice the "own wrong" bar and condonation are what sink otherwise strong petitions: resuming cohabitation after the conduct complained of, or continuing normally for years and then relying on it, invites the argument that the conduct was forgiven.
Mediation is not a formality
Family courts will refer the matter to mediation, and a large share of contested petitions convert into mutual consent once maintenance and custody are settled. That is not a failure. It is usually the fastest exit available, and it lets you control the terms rather than have them imposed.
It is also worth being honest about what a contested petition costs you beyond fees. A trial requires you to put your marriage on the record in detail, to be cross-examined about it, and to have your relatives called as witnesses. That has a real effect on any co-parenting relationship that has to survive the case. Where the other spouse is refusing consent to extract better terms rather than because they want the marriage, the settlement conversation is usually the shorter road, and can be had at any stage right up to judgment.