A lot of discussion is happening on whether Aditya and Imlie’s romance is marital or extra marital. Here are my two cents.
1. It is extra marital in terms of its timeline: Their romance definitely started after Aditya was married to Malini with a good old semblance of consent. The initial days of Aditya-Malini-Imlie had no element of romance, rather Aditya was filled with bitterness since Imlie reminded him of his lack of agency in the PD case. Therefore to claim that he was already in love with Imlie but did not realise is not the case here. He fell in love with Imlie only after he was married to Malini, which makes it an extra marital affair in terms of its timeline.
2. It is not extra marital psychologically: While we can say Aditya’s love for Imlie happened after his wedding to Malini, it would not have happened if there was no prior relationship between them per say. Imagine Imlie just lands in the Tripathy house as a random girl after Adi-Malini’s wedding? What are the chances Aditya will go after Imlie? Nil. Aditya’s love for Imlie springs from the fact that though he denies, he does consider his marriage with Imlie to be valid. What Imlie says about her age old beliefs about marriage applies to Aditya too. Aditya considers himself to be married—no matter how much he denies it verbally. It begins with a guilt and later takes the shape of a full fledged love because he feels he is entitled to Imlie. The idea of the divinity of marriage that is ingrained in us culturally is very very difficult to get rid of. Aditya goes after Imlie because not even for once does he feel it to be immoral, and he would not have pursued her if they were not “married”. The moment he makes a choice about his first wife, he has no moral compunctions to abandon the second. While it is extremely cruel on Malini, Aditya doesn’t see it as a moral issue but rather a communication issue.
This serial is actually a very good portrayal of the psychological dimensions of marriage. All three of them believe they are married, no matter how problematic their marital lives are. Most toxic marriages survive because psychologically, people are unable to “unmarry” themselves in their minds.