Quoting Vedas & Manu, Jharkhand HC Says Serving Elderly In-laws Woman's 'Cultural Duty'

Dealing with a man’s appeal against spousal maintenance, the Jharkhand High Court observed that since it was his wife who had insisted on living independently from his mother and ailing grandmother, she was not entitled to any amount of maintenance.

The bench of Justice Subhash Chand quoted Yajurveda, Rigveda and Manu, and said it was obligatory on the part of the wife to serve her husband’s mother and maternal grandmother.

“In the Constitution of India under Article 51A of Part IV-A, wherein the fundamental duties of the citizen of India are enumerated in Clause (f), it is provided ‘to value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture’. It is the culture in India to serve the old aged mother-in-law or grandmother-in-law as the case may be by the wife in order to preserve this culture,” the judge noted.

The court said in the case at hand, the issue between the couple was that the wife did not agree to serve her old in-laws and, for this reason, she created pressure on her husband to live separately from them.

“This ground is not found sufficient, that’s why the legislature while enacted under Section 125(4) of the Code of Criminal Procedure has provided one of the grounds for denial of the maintenance, if wife refuses to reside with the husband without any reasonable cause,” the court said while setting aside the order passed by a lower court allowing maintenance to the wife.

The high court, however, upheld maintenance for the couple’s minor son, who is living with the wife, and also increased the monthly amount from Rs 15,000 to Rs 25,000. The wife had made the case that she left her marital home due to harassment and dowry-related torture by her husband and mother-in-law, both of whom were doctors.

The husband contended that his wife voluntarily left his house because he refused to separate from his 75-year-old mother and 95-year-old ailing maternal grandmother. On the wife’s application under Section 125 of the CrPC, the Dumka family court had ordered the man to provide Rs 30,000 for the wife and Rs 15,000 for the four-year-old son on a monthly basis.

In his appeal, the husband argued that the order for maintenance was not just as the wife had left the house on her own. Additionally, he argued that being a postgraduate in zoology, she was fully capable of financially sustaining herself.