Of the ₹5 lakh a month a wife asked for, the Bombay High Court has allowed ₹75,000, and the reason is a single word in the statute: income.
The Nagpur Bench was hearing a husband’s challenge to an order from the Family Court, which had set interim maintenance at ₹1,00,000 a month and added ₹25,000 for litigation costs. The High Court partly allowed his plea and brought the monthly figure down to ₹75,000.
Income, not assets
The court looked at two sections of the Hindu Marriage Act. Section 24, on interim maintenance, speaks of “income”. Section 25 mentions income and property both. From that difference the court concluded that assets producing no returns cannot be weighed when interim maintenance is fixed.
The husband had said his annual income was about ₹20 lakh, and that he was also paying for his children to study abroad. His wife countered that his business interests and way of life showed a greater ability to pay.
The court found that he did draw extra income from company shareholdings. It also said she had not supplied enough detail to justify the sum she wanted.
The ruling in numbers
The couple had married in 2004 and later separated. The wife sought ₹5 lakh a month during the divorce case. She was awarded ₹1,00,000, now ₹75,000, with the ₹25,000 in litigation costs left untouched.
The bench described its remarks as prima facie. They will not bear on the final outcome of the dispute.
