ANSUYABEN AMTHARAM PATEL Vs. SAKRALAL MANGAL DAS PATEL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition by the wife against the order of the learned Sessions Judge allowing the husband's application to cancel the amount of maintenance. In order to understand which the controversy is, a few facts are required to be closely noted. The applicant wife had filed Misc. Criminal Application No. 7 of 1978 in the Court of J. M. F. C. Kalo, District : Mehsana on 3 -4 -1978 under section 125 for maintenance. The said application was allowed by the learned Magistrate by his judgment dated 25 -3 -1980 and he had directed the husband to pay the wife an amount of Rs. 200 per month as maintenance from the date of the application till the date of the judgment, i. e. from 3 -4 -1978 to 25 -3 -1980 ; and the learned Magistrate also directed that from the date of the judgment, viz., 25 -3 -1980 the amount would be payable at the rate of Rs. 250 per month. Thereafter the wife had filed the Criminal Application No. 24 of 1980 on 8 -4 -1980 under section 125(3) of the Code for recovery of the amount of maintenance due, which she was entitled to recover from the husband, and in that matter the husband had paid Rs. 4,865 to the wife as the amount of arrears of maintenance. After deposit of the said amount of maintenance with the Court the husband allegedly came to khow that this wife had filed another application being Criminal Misc. Application No. 87 of 1980 for recovery of the further amount of maintenance which had allegedly fallen due and the husband was given a notice in that matter. By that time, i. e. on or about 10 -12 -1980, the husband came to know that his wife had started serving as a teacher in the primary section of one Shantiniketan Vidya Vihar High School at Kalol and she had started earning Rs. 400 per month from that date of her appointment and she was able to maintain herself and she had concealed that fact from the Court. He had therefore made an application to the learned Magistrate praying that in those changed circumstances the order of the learned Magistrate being dated 25 -3 -1980 referred to above was required to be cancelled. That application which was filed by the husband on 15 -12 -1980 was registered as the Criminal Misc. Application No. 97 of 1980. The learned Magistrate found that the woman had started earning, but considering that that amount was not sufficient to meet all her needs the learned Magistrate refused to cancel the whole order of payment of maintenance, but he reduced the amount to Rs. 100 from Rs. 250 per month. Being aggrieved by the said order of the learned J. M. F. C., the husband had filed the Criminal Revisional Application No. 133 of 1982 before the Sessions Court ultimately praying that that whole order was required to be quashed, in those changed circumstances. The wife on the other hand filed the Criminal Revision Application No. 143 of 1982 praying that there was no case for reduction. Both the revision application obviously were heard together by the learned Additional Sessions Judge who allowed the husband's revision application by setting aside the Magistrate's order dated 8 -6 -1982 and declared that the order of the Magistrate dated 25 -3 -1980 stood cancelled from the date of the impugned order i. e. the one dated 8 -6 -1982. The consequence was that the wife's application came to be lost. Being aggrieved by the said allowing of the husband's revision application, the wife has invoked this High Court's jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution of India. This jurisdiction as emphasised by the Supreme Court, is confined to jurisdictional errors.

(2.) IT is to be noted that the maximum amount that can be awarded by the Magistrate under the provisions of section 125 awards maintenance is the amount of Rs. 500 per month. There is a finding which cannot be controverted and is not controverted that the wife was earning more than Rs. 600 per month. The learned Magistrate unfortunately was carried away by her claim of higher expenses. But the learned Sessions Judge rightly examined the question purely from jurisdictional and legalistic point of view and concluded that the wife was earning about Rs. 620 per month and she could not claim continuance of the earlier order of maintenance which was passed at the time when she was unable to maintain herself in terms of Section 125 of the Cr.P.C.

(3.) THIS revision application has no legs to stand on whatsoever and I have to dismiss it despite the strenuous efforts put forward by Mr. Patel for the wife in this matter. Rule discharged. Revision dismissed.