Hindu Husband's Obligation To Maintain Wife Attaches Even After Death; Widow Can Claim From Father-In-Law: Allahabad HC

"It is well settled that a husband is obliged to maintain his wife. This position has emanated from situations, where the spouses have separated and the wife has sought for maintenance, either on the criminal side or under maintenance provisions in Hindu law. So much so, this obligation of the husband to maintain the wife attaches even after death of the husband in the law allowing the widow to claim maintenance from her father-in-law", a Bench of Justice Arindam Sinha and Justice Satya Veer Singh observed.

Our readers may note that while the High Court did not specify a particular statutory provision in its order, Sections 19 & 21 of the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956, allow a Hindu widow to claim maintenance from her father-in-law/his estate under certain conditions. These provisions are explained later in the story.

The bench was essentially dealing with an appeal filed by a husband challenging a Family Court order rejecting his application seeking leave to prosecute his wife for perjury.

He alleged that his wife made false statements in her pleadings to claim maintenance. The husband claimed she falsely presented herself as a housewife, hiding that she was a working woman.

He further alleged that she had Fixed Deposit Receipts (FDRs) aggregating in excess of Rs 20 lakh in a Bank, but suppressed this information in her affidavit. The bench was also apprised that at present, there is about Rs. 4 lacs on FDR and the rest she has encashed.

At the outset, the HC noted that the Family Court's finding was clear that the applicant-appellant/husband did not produce any document to demonstrate that the respondent-wife was employed.

The Bench said that the onus was strictly on the husband to show she is in employment, observing that she, saying she is not employed, cannot be compelled to prove the negative.

Regarding the financial assets of the wife, the Court noted that the FDRs had been given to her by her father. The Court pointed out that a father has no obligation to maintain his daughter after her marriage, except in case she is widowed.

The Court noted it was the husband's own case that the respondent had broken the FDRs and only about Rs 4 lakh remained deposited.

The Court said this demonstrated the wife's need to maintain herself in the absence of any maintenance from the applicant-husband.

The bench also rejected the husband's argument that, since the wife had suppressed other financial details in her affidavit (to be filed as per the Supreme Court's mandatory guidelines in Rajnesh vs Neha), he was entitled to rely on it to seek leave to prosecute her.

The Court opined that the suppression is not, or cannot be, a false statement.

Thus, finding no cogent evidence produced to show that the wife had made a false statement before the Family Court, the Bench dismissed the appeal at the admission stage.

It may be noted that, as per Section 19 of HAMA, a widowed daughter-in-law can claim maintenance from her father-in-law to the extent that the widow is unable to maintain herself out of her own earnings or from her own property.

It says that the widow can only approach her father-in-law if she is entirely unable to obtain maintenance from the estate of her deceased husband, the estate of her own parents, or from her own children and their estates.

The maintenance obligation becomes unenforceable if the father-in-law lacks the means to pay it from coparcenary or ancestral property in his possession, particularly property from which the daughter-in-law has not already obtained a share.

Importantly, such obligation ceases on the remarriage of the daughter-in-law.

Also, Section 21 (viii) of the Act provides a scope to the daughter-in-law who becomes a widow before or after the death of her father-in-law to claim maintenance from his estate as long as she doesn't remarry.