I am a US citizen engaged to marry an Indian citizen who is here in the US on an H1B visa. He was married in India via an arranged marriage in 2008(unsure of exact year). he filed for divorce in india after only 4 months of marriage and living together with his ex wife(also here on a visa in US) . They lived here in the US but never filed taxes together etc as per the short time they were living together and married. When she left he had no idea where she went to live. He gave her money etc but her Visa was supposed to run out in the next 2 yrs. Now it is 2011. He filed for an ex parte divorce in Chennai in 2009 and has been fighting the ex wifes family to have the divorce decree granted. His ex wife has never appeared in court and her family was found to be bribing his other attorney not to show up to hearings etc on his behalf. He now has a new lawyer and since the 2 year mark of his filing for ex parte was june 30 2011, the ex parte and decree were supposed to be granted. finally the court agreed and apparently there is a 30 day period where her family can file an appeal with a higher court, which of course they did. Now he says we cannot marry here in the US because he still does not have a divorce in India. I only know what he is telling me of course and have no understanding of India's divorce laws. They seem somewhat similar to US divorce laws but it seems the process is much longer and more involved there when one party does not appear. There have even been rumours this woman, his ex wife is dead and that is why her family keeps preventing him from remarrying etc. Is there any way anyone here can help me to understand how this would work? If the ex parte was granted why can we not marry in the US?
