Jobless Husband Must Also Pay Maintenance To Wife

The provision of food, housing, and other necessities for living a respectable life is included in alimony. The husband has a duty to keep his wife's living situation the same as it would be in their marital residence. The process for determining the quantity of maintenance is as follows. 

Your spouse is therefore without a means of escape. The husband's sacred responsibility is to ensure that his spouse never goes without. In fact, Section 125 of CrPC has this as its societal objective.

Section 125 of Criminal Procedure Code: Abouta

• A societal goal led to the introduction of Section 125 of the CrPC. The purpose of this provision is to ensure the wife's welfare by giving her the necessary food and housing following her separation from her husband.
• Maintenance grants are one way to measure social justice. The primary responsibility of a man is to support his spouse, children, parents, immediate family, etc. when they cannot maintain themselves. 
• The idea of maintenance to wife is to improve women's and children's economic status while preventing immorality and poverty.

The Case of Maintenance: Allahabad High Court

Facts of the Case:

• In the case of Kamal v State of UP, a revision plea was filed by an Unnao man with the High Court, contesting the trial court's principal judge's ruling requiring him to provide his divorced wife with Rs 2,000 per month in maintenance. 
• The husband said in the revision request that the senior judge had overlooked the fact that the divorced wife was a graduate working as a teacher and earning Rs 10,000 a month. He also added that a doctor was treating him for a terrible illness.
• He said that he was a labourer and that he lived with his parents and sisters, who were dependent on him, in a leased room.

Issue of the Case:

• Whether the unemployed husband still has to give maintenance to his estranged wife under Section 125 of CrPC?

Ratio Decidendi by the High Court of Allahabad

• The husband was unable to present any documentation attesting to the wife's Rs 10,000 teaching salary, according to the High Court. 
• Additionally, it disregarded the man's submission that his sisters and parents depend on him and that he makes a meagre living by working as a labourer and in agriculture.
• The husband was deemed by the court to be in good health and able to work physically for pay.
• The Allahabad High Court referred to the case of Anju Garg v Deepak Kumar Garg, the revisionist is required to provide maintenance to his wife even if the court assumes that he does not receive any revenue from his employment or the rent from his Maruti Van. If the revisionist chooses to work as an unskilled labourer, he may also be paid for that labour.

Decision of the Allahabad High Court

• The Allahabad High Court's Lucknow bench has ruled that a husband must support his estranged wife even if he does not receive income from his job by working as an unskilled labourer, earning between Rs 350 and Rs 400 a day.

While Section 125 of the Criminal Procedure Code safeguards the rights of both parents as well as estranged wives to receive an appropriate amount of maintenance from their spouses, it should not be abused at any cost. The ability to challenge an order made under Section 125 has expanded in the modern era, and higher courts are increasingly considering revision requests made under Section 397 in order to give the opposing party the proper redress.

The system of law needs to evolve in order to accommodate the intricate nature of contemporary relationships as well as financial responsibilities as family dynamics do.

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