Maintaining wife, a man's moral duty: Court

A Delhi court has ordered a taxi owner to pay Rs4,500 a month to his estranged wife, saying it is a man's moral duty to maintain his wife.

"It is the moral duty of the respondent (husband) to maintain the petitioner who is his wife. She is held entitled to maintenance at Rs4,500 per month from her husband from the date of this order," Metropolitan Magistrate Kiran Gupta said while also awarding Rs2,500 as litigation cost to her.

The court gave its order on a plea by south Delhi resident Tarawati seeking maintenance from her husband Raj Kumar who resided at Paharganj in central Delhi area and owned a taxi.

Tarawati demanded the maintenance, accusing her husband of inflicting cruelty on her and abandoning her.

Married to Kumar in May, 2002, she had moved the court for maintenance in December, 2006. She demanded the maintenance saying she has no source of income to support her while her husband earned around Rs20,000 a month.

She said he was also having an additional income of Rs75,000 a year from his agricultural land.

"Kumar had no obligation except to maintain me (wife) as his father was retired from Indian Railways and was getting a handsome pension and his mother was living with his father," she said.

But as she failed to present any documentary proof for her estranged husband's income, the court, on the basis of provisions for Minimum Wages Act, assessed his income to be at least Rs9,000 a month and, accordingly, ordered him to pay Rs4,500 a month to his wife as maintenance.

"Tarawati is doing stitching and crafting and earns more than Rs5,000 per month. I am a daily wager and is not earning more than Rs2,000 per month," Kumar said.