Lucknow, June 1 -- The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court has ruled that Lok Adalats and district legal services authorities( DLSAs) have no jurisdiction to grant divorce decrees. The court said the power to dissolve a marriage rests exclusively with family courts, while the authority of Lok Adalats is limited to facilitating settlements between parties, and it cannot render judicial decisions. A division bench comprising Justice Shekhar B Saraf and Justice A K Chaudhary recently passed the verdict on a petition by a woman challenging an order by DLSA, Unnao in 2018. Her husband, she alleged, had treated the settlement recorded by the DLSA as a decree of divorce and relied on it as the basis for remarriage. The court observed that under the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987, and the National Legal Services Authority (Lok Adalat) Regulations, 2009, matrimonial disputes involving divorce cannot be referred to Lok Adalats for adjudication. It emphasised that the role of a Lok Adalat is confined to promoting amicable settlement between parties and not to deciding disputes judicially. HTC...