MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court on Tuesday enhanced monthly interim maintenance seven times, from Rs 50,000 to Rs 3.5 lakh, for a wife in Pune. This decision came after observing that the estranged husband approached the court with “unclean hands and lack of credibility” in a matrimonial dispute. The couple married in 1997 and separated in 2013. The husband filed for divorce in 2015, and the family court in Pune granted it in 2023 on grounds of cruelty, which the High Court stayed in appeal. There are cross appeals before the HC.“The marriage lasted 16 years, with the prime of life having been invested in the marriage, is an important factor that has not been taken into consideration by the family court when assessing the permanent alimony, and that needs to be corrected,” the High Court said, clarifying all its observations are prima facie in nature pending disposal of the appeals.
The division bench of Justices B P Colabawala and Somasekhar Sundaresan, cited and invoked “the objective of welfare of a divorced wife, which underlies the duty of maintenance” under the law governing matrimonial disputes.The “globe-trotter” husband suppressed his true “financial strength” and made “positive mis-statements” in his claim of being unable to pay even the original low maintenance, the High Court said. The husband’s family has a family business. The wife’s broad assessment of the land bank the family business is sitting on, being worth over Rs 1,000 crore, is “quite convincing” according to the Group’s own claim on its website, said the HC.The HC noted that the husband adorns designer t-shirts but questions the wife’s monthly expenses of Rs 1 lakh as “exorbitant” amounts. He, himself a trekker, faults his daughter, who also treks, for spending Rs 8,000 on fitness and yoga classes. The family court had directed the businessman husband to pay the wife Rs 50,000 per month as interim maintenance during the divorce proceeding, and in the final decree, fixed the alimony at Rs 50,000 per month.The husband was regularly in arrears on interim maintenance, the High Court said, and observed that even if his share in the family business is 10 percent, “it would mean that he is a man of undeniably powerful financial means, with his share in the land bank alone coming to over Rs 100 crores.” The wife’s plea for enhanced maintenance was found by the High Court to be reasonable, even “frugal,” considering the standard of living his child “should reasonably expect to have.““A reasonable estimation of the standard of living and lifestyle of the couple during their 16-year-long marriage would need to be informed by the lifestyle of a man of means on such a scale. There is no reason to discount such a standard of living, with maintenance being fixed at a measly sum of Rs 50,000 per month for a wife of 16 years, and even for that, having her struggle just to recover arrears,” the High Court reasoned.The High Court said the husband’s pleading would suggest that “he lives a life of penury and a hand-to-mouth existence, being unable to afford paying even a bare sum of Rs 50,000 per month.” “Such pleadings on oath erode the credibility of his contentions,” the High Court added. The husband argued against any enhancement of maintenance, saying that despite claims of no source of income, the estranged wife was spending on yoga and fitness trainers, baking, and music classes for her daughter. The High Court said it was unable to appreciate such an argument and “not just for its patriarchal tenor.”“The contention is that a woman divorced from her husband should curtail what her daughter should get, but a woman choosing not to leave her husband can expect more,” the High Court observed, adding, “That a mother dares to work hard and even claim to depend on her own brother to give the daughter (who is as much Mukesh’s offspring) a decent life, cannot be a disqualification for expecting that the daughter’s expenses for a decent standard of living be met by the father, commensurate with his own standard of living and, more importantly, the parents’ joint standard of living when the marriage lasted.“The wife, who argued in person, is entitled to lead a life of dignity and provide her daughter with a life of dignity and is entitled to a maintenance amount that is commensurate with such entitlement, the High Court added, noting the family court did not grant anything separately for the daughter. Disposing the interim application on maintenance, the HC said that pending cross-appeals against the divorce decree, maintenance must be commensurate with the expenses the woman is incurring towards the potential professional education of their child.The husband, represented by advocate Dushyant Purekar argued that her plea for maintenance before the family court had invoked an incorrect law. The High Court said the family court was entitled to treat it as an application for interim maintenance, given that it is a socio-welfare legislation in play.The wife’s lawyer Edith Dey on Thursday said she has filed a caveat before the Supreme Court, in case the husband seeks to challenge the HC order.
