Respected sir, my husband was taken lots of unreasonable adjournments to delay the judgment in my maintenance petition. I have filed a petition in the year 2000 and got judgment in September 2015.
The court in the judge gave the order of maintenance from the date of order instead of from the date of filing of the petition. No interim maintenance had been received and no other relief was sought by me. I want to appeal this judgment for giving maintenance from the date filing of my petition. Can you advise me the correct proposition of law?
Section 125 of the code of criminal procedure [crpc] provides a swift remedy to get maintenance from the husband. In many cases husband refuses to give maintenance and take unnecessary adjournment on the filing of the application. Unfortunately, your case continued for 15 years before the court to decide. It is a rule that maintenance would be awarded from the date of order [K. Shivaram vs Mangalamba (1990) Cri LJ].
But the court has the power to grant maintenance from the date of filing of the application by recording special reasons [section 354(6) CRPC] Shail Kumari Devi vs Krishna Bhagwan Pathak [2008] 9 SCC. You should have pleaded for granting of maintenance from the date of filing of the application. Without pleading this fact court is not bound to grant maintenance from the date of filing of the application.
However in exceptional cases when the court found that husband deliberately causing delay court can pass such order. In Shail Kumari Devi vs Krishna Bhagwan Pathak [2008] 9 SCC Supreme court has held that in conducive of justice in the case court may order to grant maintenance from the date of application if husband obstructing petition by taking unreasonable adjournments in the case. This is reiterated in the case of Krishna Jain 1992 Cri. LJ.
You should file an appeal in the high court based on aforesaid judgment for granting maintenance from the date of filing of the application.