M V CSASTRI Vs. RADHALAKSHMI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a regrettable case in which the dispute is between husband and wife, about the amount of maintenance and certain articles dammed by her. The parties are Hindus belonging to respectable families of the same community. They were married in 1938 at Salem where the plaintiff's father was practising as a Vakil. The plaintiff joined the defendant in 1940 after the consummation ceremony at Bangalore by which time her father had died and continued to be with him till the end Of May 1944, except during intervals of absence on account of her confinement in her mother's place and occasional visits. Barring differences of the usual type between an individualistic daughter-in-law and an imperious mother-in-law in a Hindu home, the family consisting of plaintiff, her husband, a child and mother-in-law normally and the father-in-law too, off and on, seems to have got on well enough, on the whole, without any apparent discomfort or discord. The incident which broke up or led to the breaking up of the plaintiff's association with the defendant (at least for the time being) was, her leaving away the house alone at an early hour in the morning of 31-5-1944 to her sister's house in Bangalore and then proceeding with her to Salem, contrary to the defendant's injunctions on the previous night, and failure to return home, though sent for. The subsequent conduct of the plaintiff in staying away for months and that of her relations in accusing the defendant & his parents of subjecting her to ill-treatment, intensified the indignation against her to such an extent as to make her own belated entreaties and piteous appeals and the earnest solicitations of her mother, other relations and well-wishers -- all to be of no avail. Besides being relentless to the plaintiff, the defendant married another girl in June 1956 and this seems to have precipitated and widened the breach between the two.

(2.) The estrangement led at first to an application for a writ of Habeas Corpus being filed by the plaintiff in the High Court at Madras against the defendant and his father for custody of the child -- the only offspring of the marriage, on the ground that it was about to be removed to Rangoon. On the assurance that there was no such possibility the application was dismissed on 5-8-1916. In January 1947, a notice was issued and another in the following month through a Vakil at Salem to the defendant demanding maintenance to the plaintiff and delivery of her Jewels and articles. The notices were returned unserved and shortly after, the suit from which this appeal arises was filed for recovery of the same. The claim for maintenance was disputed in the beginning but later conceded, the determination of the amount being left to the Court, without offer of any particular sum. The plaintiff claimed Rs. 100/- per month from the date of the defendant's second marriage and has obtained a decree for payment at Rs. 75/- per month. Of the moveables claimed, only a few which were admitted to be plaintiff's are returned, the right to the rest being repudiated. The claim to some of the articles in dispute has been upheld and with respect to others disallowed or rejected. The defendant has, in the appeal preferred by him, objected to the award of any maintenance for the period prior to suit, to the award of Rs. 40/- in excess of Rs. 35/- he now agrees to pay for future maintenance and, to the direction for payment of any amount whatever to the plaintiff as value of articles. The plaintiff, on the other hand, seeks enhancement of the sum now awarded for maintenance to Rs. 100/- and payment of the value of the disallowed items in the cross-objections filed by her.

(3.) The suit was filed in a Court at Bangalore as the defendant; was living and employed then and for some time before, within its jurisdiction and as the movables claimed by the plaintiff were said to be with him. As regards maintenance, the claim was based in the plaint, on defendant's alleged cruelty and re-marriage. At the trial no evidence about cruelty was adduced or allowed, as the defendant's re-marriage alone was considered to be sufficient under the provisions of the Mysore Hindu Law Women's Rights Act (No. 10 of 1933) to entitle the plaintiff to maintenance. In view of the statement at the end of the written statement that "the parties to the suit are not domiciled Mysoreans, they are governed, by the existing British Indian Laws" and the statement of the defendant at page 133 of the printed record and of his father at page 98 "that defendant could not get a job here as he was a British subject domiciled in Burma", the applicability of the Act to the case raised a doubt, as it has been held in -- '51 Mys HCR 301 (A)-, that the Act cannot apply to a person unless he is a subject of Mysore. Though the plea is not given up or found to be untrue, the learned Judge has relied upon the Act and made a decree in plaintiff's favour treating the defendant's agreeableness to the maintenance being fixed as enough for the purpose. The applicability of the Act does not depend on the inclination or option of a party to be bound or not bound by it; nor can it be applied because the parties want or wish it to be applied. As stated in -- 'Venkataraman v. A. C. Janaki', AIR 1939 Mad 595 (B).