Common Strategy Adopted By Well-Qualified Husbands To Quit Jobs To Avoid Paying Maintenance: Delhi High Court Dismisses Petition Of CRPF Officer Who Voluntarily Retired

The High Court was considering a petition challenging a judgment of the Family Court awarding maintenance to the wife and children of the petitioner.

The Single Bench of Justice Amit Mahajan held, “The petitioner has failed to explain the circumstances which led him to taking voluntary retirement in July, 2022 when he was around 47 years old, despite having years of service left. Although the learned Trial Court has noted that no government employee will ordinarily take retirement with the sole intention of depriving his wife and children of the benefit of maintenance, however, as per the deposition of the petitioner, he was deriving no income from the agricultural land despite efforts to cultivate the same. Just as employed wives allegedly leave their jobs to gain an upper hand in maintenance disputes, quitting of jobs is similarly a common strategy adopted by well-qualified husbands to avoid paying proper amount of maintenance as well. It appears to be implausible that the petitioner would have taken retirement from his stable well-paying job without securing any other mode of income.”

“Considering that it is common for government employees to take up employment in private sector after voluntary retirement and that the petitioner is a wellbodied man capable of earning, he cannot shirk his sacrosanct duty to financially support his wife and children by claiming that he has no income after retirement apart from his pension. The petitioner is thus obliged to earn and maintain his family, and the purported lower MSP prices for his land would thus not help his case”, it added.

Advocate Gurpreet Singh represented the Petitioner, while Advocate Deepak Garg represented the Respondent.

Arguments

It was the husband’s case that the Family Court did not appreciate that the wife had admitted that she was residing at her paternal house, which showed that the shared household had been let out by her for financial gains. He further submitted that his income has been assessed on the higher side without appreciating that he was no longer employed with the Central Reserve Police and was a mere agriculturalist.

It was the wife’s case that her children are both pursuing their higher education, and there is no source of income as she is only a housewife.

Reasoning

The Bench, at the outset, reaffirmed that the object of granting maintenance is to prevent vagrancy by compelling those who can provide support to those who are unable to support themselves and who have a moral claim to support. The Bench explained the conditions enumerated in Section 125 of the CrPC under which a wife may be deemed ineligible for maintenance. These conditions include instances where the wife is engaged in adulterous activities, where she, without any justifiable cause, refuses to cohabit with her husband, or where both parties have agreed to live apart through mutual consent.

Coming to the facts of the case, the Bench noted that the parties were undisputedly living separately since the year 2013, and the wife was taking care of their children. It was noticed that the petitioner had not challenged the maintenance awarded to his son, who had since attained the age of majority. The Bench was of the view that merely because the wife remained in possession of the matrimonial house, the same did not signify that the petitioner did not neglect to maintain the respondents. “Even if the contention of the petitioner is taken as correct, the case of the respondents is not helmed on Respondent No.1 leaving the company of the petitioner due to neglect, so as to disentitle her from grant of maintenance”, it added.

The Bench noted that although the petitioner was stated to have taken voluntary retirement from CRPF only in July, 2022, his income was peculiarly assessed on the basis of the pension as well as purported agricultural yield for the period starting from the filing of the respondents’ application under Section 125 of the CrPC in January, 2016. It was thus noted that the petitioner remained in employment till July, 2022, and this aspect could not be ignored while assessing his income for the concerned period.

The Bench refused to accept any assertion of the husband having no source of income apart from his pension pursuant to retirement. Thus, on an overall consideration of the facts of the case and considering that the petitioner’s income would have gone above ₹40,000 approximately by the year 2019 and the Trial Court had only awarded an increase in maintenance amount by 10% after every two years from passing of the impugned order, the Bench held that the awarded maintenance was reasonable.

Thus, holding that the impugned order did not warrant any interference, the Bench dismissed the petition.

Cause Title: P v. Q (Neutral Citation: 2026:DHC:2170)

Appearance

Petitioner: Advocates Gurpreet Singh, Vaishnavi Vashishta

Respondent: Advocates Deepak Garg, Mohan Singh, Sachin Kumar, Vishakha Deswal, Robin Singh,

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