XYP v XYQ and 4 other matters

Facts

A wife filed five applications for Personal Protection Orders in the Family Court against her husband and her parents-in-law, SSP 1440, 1441, 1480, 1479 and 1410 of 2025; the husband had filed one on behalf of the child against her. She acted in person. There were divorce proceedings in Singapore and, she said, proceedings in India.

On 26 September 2025 the court directed her to file an affidavit of foreign law explaining the Indian proceedings. On 24 November 2025 she had not done so and was ordered to file it forthwith. She then missed an urgent mentions, although allowed to attend by Zoom, and gave no valid excuse. The court struck her five applications off the hearing list, to be reinstated only if she filed the affidavit by 3 December 2025. On 1 December 2025 she filed a one-page document described as that affidavit and asked for the applications to be restored.

Issues

1. Whether the wife's applications should be struck off for her absence from the mentions.
2. Whether the one-page document complied with the court's directions on the affidavit of foreign law.
3. Whether the wife should be given permission to reinstate her applications.

Holding

The Family Court ordered that the wife's five Personal Protection Order applications remain struck off the hearing list and refused her permission to reinstate them.

Reasoning

Striking off is the usual practice when an applicant misses a mentions without a valid excuse, and PPO applications are meant to move to hearing quickly.

The one-page document said nothing about the status or nature of the Indian proceedings, which was the information the court had asked for so that it could manage any overlap, so it plainly did not comply.

As the condition for reinstatement was not met, the court declined to restore the applications. The wife had been told what was required and why, and had neither complied nor explained why she could not.

From the judgment