Mumbai: For the purpose of granting
maintenance to a neglected wife under section 125 of criminal
procedure code (CrPC), no strict proof of marriage is
required, Bombay High Court recently held.
The verdict by Justice Abhay Oka might bolster the case
of Maharashtra government, which had proposed to amend the
CrPC to extend benefit of maintenance to those women who could
not prove the legality of their marriage.
Pronouncing the verdict last week, Justice Oka awarded a
maintenance of Rs 500 per month, with arrears since 1991, to
petitioner Suman.
In her petition, Suman said that she got married to
Nivrutti Satav in 1981.
Accusing him of marrying another woman, Surekha, after an
year, she alleged that Nivrutti used to ill-treat her and
threw her out of the house in 1991.
Suman -- who had a daughter from Nivrutti -- applied for
maintenance in a magistrate`s court but was denied as she
failed to prove her marriage to him.
Nivrutti, in the court, also denied marrying her.
She challenged the decision before the High Court, which
observed that "courts below proceeded on erroneous footing
that it was necessary for the woman to strictly establish the
marriage by establishing performance of religious rites" and
awarded the maintenance to her.
The objective of the CrPC provision was just to make
available to woman a "speedy remedy to obtain maintenance",
the High Court said.
The High Court, further, said, that as per the Supreme
Court`s earlier rulings "standard of proof of marriage" in
cases under Section 125 of CrPC is not as strict as in other
cases.
"Supreme Court has held that if the applicant in
application under section 125 succeeds in showing that she had
lived together with the respondent as wife and husband, the
Court can presume that they are legally wedded spouses",
Justice Oka noted.
The judge observed that in her case, Sarpanch and police
patil of Phursungi (district Pune) had testified that Nivrutti
was living with her for seven to eight years.
In the CrPC amendment, proposed by state government, a
woman who has lived as wife with a man can claim maintenance
though she may not have undergone marriage rites.
But the proposal is yet to make any headway, as
opposition as well as some members of ruling Congress-NCP are
opposing it saying the government wanted to "legalise" live-in
relationships through this amendment.
Bureau Report
