Ketaki vs Girish '' Satish

M.S. Ratnaparkhi, J.—The present respondent Girish has initiated a matrimonial petition No. 86 of 1987 before the Joint Civil Judge, Senior Division, Nagpur. The petition is pending before the Joint Civil Judge, Senior Division, Nagpur. In this petition a divorce has been claimed. The present petitioner Ketaki is the wife of Girish, the respondent.

During the pendency of this matrimonial petition the wife Ketaki filed an application Exh-8 for interim alimony pendente lite. She claimed Rs. 1,500/-per month by way of interim alimony for herself and her child and Rs. 3.000/- for expenses of the litigation. The present respondent filed his reply denying the quantum.

The present petitioner then filed an application before the Court for permission to lead evidence on the question of interim alimony. Her contention was that as the respondent has denied the quantum of earning, as alleged by her, she should be allowed to lead evidence. The trial Court passed the following order :--

"The applicant may adduce the evidence on affidavit, if she wants."

It is this order which has been challenged in this revision.

Mr. Gokhale, the learned advocate for the petitioner, vehemently urged before me that the trial Court ought to have permitted her to lead oral evidence. Looking to the nature of the claim envisaged under , Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act, it can be said without much difficulty that the arrangement is only temporary pendente life. It is supposed to be a summary trial and not a trial on merits at length. The purpose underlying it is also very clear. The Court is expected to dispose of such application as early as possible. It is only on the decision of such application that the real trial starts. A discretion has been vested In the Court what evidence should be led at the stage of such trial. In the present case, the Court did consider the request made by the present petitioner and then it came to the conclusion that evidence on affidavit would be enough. It means, and it is inherent in the order itself that before passing this order the Court applied its mind and it found that the case could be disposed of on this evidence of affidavit and there were no special circumstances envisaging the recording of the evidence viva voce. The discretion has been thus used by the Court and as the record stands, it cannot be said that the Court wrongly used this discretion. In Vinay Kumar Vs. Smt. Purnima Devi, the Court held :

"Therefore, the idea in enacting this rule seems to be that the matter arising u/s 24 of the Act has, by and large, to be decided on the basis of affidavits. This is, however, not to say that no evidence ever should be recorded. In appropriate case where the Court finds that the matter cannot be disposed of properly on the basis of affidavits alone, then it may proceed to record evidence and then decide the matter."

It is thus clear from the abovesaid principle that it is only in exceptional cases that the Court can call upon the party to adduce evidence in the matter. The normal course adopted in such circumstances is the evidence on affidavit.

We have to consider on this background whether the order passed by the trial Court was in any way wrong. It is after all a summary trial and, therefore, the discretion used by the Court in allowing the evidence on affidavits cannot be called as wrong, particularly when no special circumstances are brought on record. The order passed by the trial Court is, therefore, quite proper and it needs no interference at the hands of this Court, with the result that the revision application is dismissed. Rule is discharged. There shall be no order as to costs.