Jaibir Singh vs Roshni and Another

Jitendra Chauhan, J.—The present revision petition has been filed for setting aside the judgment dated 6.12.2012, passed by learned District Judge, Family Court, whereby the application u/s 125 Cr.P.C. filed by the respondents was allowed and petitioner has been ordered to pay a sum of Rs. 4000/- per month each of the respondents as maintenance allowance. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that the learned District Judge has committed error while granting maintenance. The petitioner is poor a person. He further submits that the respondent No. 1 herself left the matrimonial home without any cause. No evidence with regard to the income of the petitioner was produced before the learned District Judge.

Heard and perused.

The learned District Judge while allowing the application u/s 125 Cr.P.C., has observed as under:-

Law is well settled that the object of maintenance proceedings is not to punish a person for his past neglect, but to prevent vagrancy by compelling those who can do so to support those who are unable to support themselves and who have moral claim to support. Section 125 of Cr.P.C. gives effect tot eh fundamental and natural duty of a man to maintain his wife, children and parents when they are unable to maintain themselves. The said section provides a swift and cheap remedy against any person who despite sufficient means neglects or refuses to maintain his wife, minor or major child either legitimate or illegitimate (being a married daughter), his father or mother when they are unable to maintain themselves. The primary object of the section is to prevent starvation and vagrancy. This section is a measure of social justice and is specifically enacted to protect women and children and falls within the constitutional sweep of Article 15(3) reinforced by Article 39 of the Constitution. The object is to compel a man to perform the moral obligation which he owes to society in respect of his wife, children and parents so that they are not left beggared and destituted on the scrapheap of society and thereby driven to a life of vagrancy, immorality and crime for their subsistence. The jurisdiction of the Court is preventive and no remedial and certainly not punitive.

The marriage between the petitioner No. 1 and the respondent is not disputed. It has come in the evidence that the petitioner No. 1 has got no source of income to maintain herself as well as her minor daughter and she is residing alongwith her parents at the moment since the day when she was turned out of her matrimonial home. Keeping in view the totality of the circumstances and currently soaring prices of the bare necessities of daily life, such as food, medicines, clothes and other unforeseen incidental expenses vis-a-vis and earning capacity of the parties, the ends of justice would be served if the respondent is directed to pay a sum of Rs. 4000/- per month to each of the petitioners as maintenance allowance from the date of filing of the petition. It is ordered accordingly and the petition thus stands disposed of finally, without any order as to costs.

Respondent No. 1 alongwith her minor daughter is residing in her parental home, as she was turned out from her matrimonial home. If the petitioner wanted to join the respondents, he could have approached the complainant/respondent or would have filed a petition for restitution of conjugal rights. However, the petitioner has chosen to file a petition u/s 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act for grant of decree of divorce. Admittedly, the petitioner is having agricultural land yielding sufficient income. In the circumstance, the amount awarded is not on higher side. In view of the above, this Court finds no illegality of perversity in the order passed by the learned District Judge, Family Court, Hisar. Accordingly, the present revision petition is dismissed being devoid of any merit.