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Matrimony and Maintenance

The Allahabad High Court has recently decreed that in matrimonial disputes involving multiple maintenance proceedings under different legislations, the claim seeking the highest maintenance should be adjudicated first by the concerned court. The verdict came after multiple orders providing for maintenance allowance were  passed by different family courts in Uttar Pradesh

On October 19, the Allahabad High Court referred to the Supreme Court’s verdict in Rajnesh vs Neha & Anr, regarding multiple deductions for maintenance and said that in matrimonial disputes involving multiple maintenance proceedings under different legislations, the claim seeking the highest maintenance should be adjudicated first by the concerned court. 

The Division Bench of Justices Saumitra Dayal Singh and Donadi Ramesh dismissed an appeal filed by an army officer who had challenged multiple maintenance orders issued by a family court in favour of his estranged wife.

The appeal was filed under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act, 1984, arising from the order dated July 26, 2024, passed by the Additional Principal Judge, Family Court, Etawah. By that order, the Family Court provided for interim maintenance of Rs 5,000 per month to the respondent/wife under Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, from the date of her application i.e March 10, 2023. The judge further awarded a lump sum amount of Rs 10,000 towards legal expenses. The grievance of the appellant/ husband was that as a Lance Naik/Sipahi with the Indian Army, he was drawing a salary of roughly Rs 50,000 per month and the paying such amounts will impose a huge financial burden on him.

The respondent/wife first instituted proceedings under Section 125 CrPC, on June 1, 2019, seeking maintenance allowance, but it remained pending. Meanwhile, at the instance of the respondent/wife, a provision was made under the relevant service rules—providing for deduction and payment of monthly maintenance allowance (to her), under the Army Order. The salary account statement of the appellant/husband for the period June 2021 to April 2023 showed that the deductions were made directly from the monthly salary paid to the appellant.

At the same time, during the pendency of the aforesaid application filed under Section 125 CrPC, the respondent/wife further filed another application under Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, seeking maintenance allowance during the pendency of the divorce case instituted by the appellant/husband. This application was filed on March 10, 2023. The respondent/wife instituted yet another proceeding under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005. There again, the respondent/wife sought payment of interim maintenance allowance. That proceeding (instituted under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act) remained pending. By two separate orders passed on the same date July 26, 2024, the family court provided for payment of interim maintenance allowance of Rs 11,000 per month under Section 125 of CrPC and Rs 5,000 per month under Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.

The High Court said that for the last three months, it had observed a steady flow of similar proceedings coming to the Court by way of statutory appeals involving multiple orders providing for interim/final maintenance allowance, passed by different family courts in the state, while dealing with applications filed under Section 125 CrPC; Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955; Special Marriage Act, 1954; Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, etc. The Court noted that insofar as such orders were found existing in old appeals arising from orders passed by law, it was declared by the Supreme Court in Rajnesh vs Neha & Anr (supra), that the same did not call for any special notice by the Court. However, even after that declaration of the law by the Supreme Court, the trend continues unabated. 

The bench observed that multiple orders were being passed providing for interim maintenance sometimes on the same date and sometimes on different dates, without conforming to the parameters settled by the Supreme Court in Rajnesh vs Neha & Anr (supra), that too without following the procedure commended in that decision.

The bench further stated that the standardized summary procedure elaborated in that binding decision is not being uniformly followed. That procedure, when followed, may take care of the urgent and imperative need to provide for interim/final maintenance allowance to the needy in real time. That may help arrest the spread of the fire of the family dispute, in which many citizens unfortunately may find themselves in. Due to their marriage, the non-earning spouse has a right to share the money earned by the earning spouse to sustain, that too with their dignity intact.

The bench further observed that merely because the spouses may be living separately for reasons of matrimonial discord, the earning spouse cannot deprive the other (non-earning spouse), access to their family earnings. It said that the decision in Rajnesh vs Neha & Anr (supra) is a compendium of the law on the subject. It covers almost all aspects of maintenance to be addressed by the family courts and other courts, etc., in the context of the statutory laws that operate in the field. 

Considering the comprehensive analysis of the law made by the Supreme Court, the bench further observed that the family courts in Uttar Pradesh are still (generally) unable to enforce that law in entirety, and the Court must first consider it proper to refer to the relevant parts of the said judgement to highlight the areas that need urgent, undiluted attention of all family courts in Uttar Pradesh to ensure its full compliance, without any delay or exception. That law needs to be applied strictly. Any departure bears serious consequences on the litigating public and has a serious impact on the delays and pendency of cases that accumulate with courts each day.

The verdict in Rajnesh vs Neha & Anr (supra) clearly lays down a firm rule against multiple deductions or recoveries, towards interim/final maintenance allowance. The award of maintenance allowance, made under one law (in this case, service law), would always satisfy the recovery of maintenance allowance for an equal or lesser amount, directed under any order passed by any court or authority, under any other statutory law (Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, in this case). Thus, no (further) recovery may be made pursuant to any order/s providing for equal or less monthly interim/final maintenance allowance, so long as an equal or higher sum of maintenance allowance has been or is being paid under another order providing for equal or higher interim/final maintenance allowance.

The bench also stated that where more than one order is passed, arising from more than one application filed by a claimant (under different enactments), the respective courts must act with pragmatism. Often different applications are filed under different statutes claiming different amounts, for different periods—depending on the date of filing of such applications. There, subject to all or more than one application becoming ripe for hearing (before the same court) and in the absence of any exceptional fact existing, such court may first decide the application seeking the higher/highest maintenance allowance. That would avoid any chance of duplication of proceedings for the same or similar amount. For the same/overlapping/ different period, the same/similar amount may be claimed through different applications. Courts may make note of the earlier order/s passed on the application seeking higher/highest maintenance allowance and dispose of such other application’s, mindful of that decision.

The bench stated that the course would save valuable time on the courts as also the parties. Normally, the scale or slab of income of the payer spouse does not fluctuate rapidly—from

year to year. That approach will help attain consistency of reasoning and proportionality in quantification of maintenance allowance, for different periods and/or under different enactments. It is truer of those who derive income from salary or business and profession. Thus, assessment of entitlement, and need of the claimant and capacity of the payer, once assessed, may set the template for the parties, in the other similar proceedings.

Often, the estranged spouse is a homemaker with no earning of her own. Being financially vulnerable, she suffers indignity of dependence on others, that too in the circumstance of being forced out of her own home, often with her children. This incurs an element of humiliation of varying degree, as the financially vulnerable partner of the enterprise of marriage is made to bear the brunt of the discord suffered in that relationship, irrespective of her contribution in that discord arising or continuing. 

The bench further observed that in almost all such cases, where the parties are eventually able to resolve their matrimonial discord, criminal cases are dropped. However, that happens after years, if not decades, of time lost. During that time, the most productive years that any citizen may contribute to society have been lost. 

—By Adarsh Kumar and India Legal Bureau

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