Maintenance to wife not charity, but a right to uphold equity, justice: Andhra HC

Upholding a family court's order awarding ₹7,500 per month maintenance to Chinnam Kiranmayi Smily and ₹5,000 per month to her minor son, Justice Y Lakshmana Rao said maintenance jurisprudence in India stands as a testament to the judiciary's resolve. Justice Rao said the resolve is to ensure that no wife, child, or dependent parent is left languishing in penury due to the neglect of those legally bound to sustain them. "Courts have consistently reiterated that maintenance is not charity but a right, and its enforcement is essential to uphold equity, justice, and good conscience. Thus, maintenance jurisprudence in India stands as a testament to the judiciary's resolve to ensure that no wife, child, or dependent parent is left to languish in penury due to the neglect of those legally bound to sustain them," said the High Court Judge in his order on February 9. Aggrieved over the family court's order on March 3, 2018, Chinnan Kishore Kumar moved the High Court, arguing that it suffers from perversity and material irregularity. Kumar's criminal revision case asserted that the family court had erred in granting maintenance and accused his estranged wife of initiating multiple proceedings. Further, he noted that the order mandating the payment of ₹7,500 per month to his wife and ₹5,000 per month to his minor son is excessive, arbitrary, and violative of the principles of natural justice. He urged the High Court to set aside the family court's judgment as being unsustainable in law. However, Justice Rao ordered that maintenance is conceived as a dynamic instrument of constitutional empathy, falling within the protective ambit of Articles 15 and 39 of the Constitution. "It is a manifestation of the State's commitment to safeguard weaker sections of society, particularly women and children, from neglect and economic deprivation," he said. The liability to maintain is continuous, enforceable, and insulated from considerations of proprietary holdings, flowing solely from the existence of the marital or familial relationship. "The right to maintenance thereunder is not a one-time bounty but an ambulatory, recurring entitlement, crystallising afresh upon each breach of obligation, untrammelled by the pendency or outcome of collateral matrimonial proceedings," he said, among other observations in his order. Moreover, Justice Rao stressed that the family court granting maintenance exemplifies a judicious exercise of discretion, firmly anchored in the sacrosanct principles of social justice, among other observations.