Priyadarshan, Lissy sign divorce papers

Clearing the decks for their divorce, Malayalam film director S Priyadarshan and his actor-wife Y Lissy today appeared before a family court here and signed all papers required for the legal separation.
It is expected that a formal order granting decree of divorce to the couple, married for 24 years, would be issued by the principal family court here onSeptember 20.
They appeared before the family court and signed all the papers that are required for the divorce.
Soon after the family court proceedings, Lissy issued a statement saying "My marriage with Mr Priyadarshan officially ended today. We both have signed the final papers at the HonourableFamily Court here in Chennai today."

"This has been a real ordeal. In recent times all celebrity divorces, from Hrithik and Sussane to Dilip and Manju to most recently Amala and Vijay all have been mutually agreed divorces.I am sure it also must have been painful to those couples but whatever differences they may have had, they all decided to respect each other.
"Ours was the only exception where it was often fierce and uncivilized battle on and off the courts until a compromise was reached at thehonourable High Court in Chennai. Perhaps the ugliness of our divorce proceedings says all about the kind of marriage we have had," Lissy said.

Stating that she felt relieved now, the actor thanked lawyers, friends and well wishers for their unconditional support and prayers.

Several cases were filed by the couple in connection with divorce, domestic violence and harassment, besides division of properties and most of them were settled because of the mediation and initiative that was carried out by Justice K K Sasidharan of Madras High Court when the cases came up before him in February last.
A compromise memo was then filed before the high court by the couple stating that they will peruse divorce by mutual consent and withdraw all pending cases and allegations in the family court against each other.

It also provided for division of properties among the two.
Priyadarshan and Lissy have a daughter and a son, who are settled abroad.