KR KIRPAL SINGH Vs. CHANDRAWATI DEVI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These are two appeals which arise out of a suit which was brought by the plaintiff, Sm. Chandrawati Devi, for a maintenance allowance, for certain arrears of allowance since 1937 and for her residence in a portion of the house occupied by the defendant. In F. A. No. 119 of 1946 the plaintiff is the appellant. Her grievance with the judgment of the learned Additional Civil Judge is that instead of allowing her maintenance at the rate of Rs. 225 a month, a sum of Rs. 150 per month has been fixed by the learned Judge as future maintenance; that for eleven months prior to the institution of the suit that she has been held to be living separate from the defendant, the arrears of maintenance allowed is only at Rs. 40 per month and not at the rate allowed to her for her future maintenance and that the learned Judge's view of the period for which arrears of maintenance should be allowed is incorrect as she claims to have established by evidence on the record that she has been living separate from her brother-in-law, the defendant, for the whole period for which the past arrears of maintenance were claimed. First Appl. No. 200 of 1945 has been filed by the defendant and is directed against the decree of the learned Civil Judge fixing the maintenance of the lady at Rs. 150 per month, it being the case of the defendant that the rate of maintenance is much too high. As both these appeals arise out of the same suit and are directed against the same judgment and were connected by this Court, they have been heard together. We shall dispose of them by the same judgment.

(2.) Before dealing with the points which have arisen in the case, it will be convenient to give a few salient facts relating to the case of the respective parties to the appeals. The plaintiff's husband, Mahtab Singh, was the brother of the defendant, Kripal Singh. He died six months after his marriage with the plaintiff in October 1929. According to the case set up by the plaintiff, the husband was joint with his brother and at the time of her husband's death in 1929 her brother-in-law was a minor. Her brother-in-law attained majority about 7 years back and has been managing the property since then. The plaintiff had been living with him till 1937, when she left her husband's house and started living with her parents. Repeated requests by her for a maintenance allowance and a separate residence in the family house having met with no response, she instituted the suit on 2-1-1943 for a fixed maintenance allowance at the rate of Rs. 225 per month and for a sum of Rs. 8000 for the years that she had been living separate from her brother-in-law. According to the version for which she has made herself responsible, the zemindari income of the property was Rs. 7500.

(3.) The suit was resisted by the defendant on the ground that he had not placed any obstacles in the way of the plaintiff's living in the family house, that he was not responsible for her leaving the family residence, that the income of the family has been grossly exaggerated, that the maintenance allowance claimed was far too excessive, that it was only since February 1942 that she had left the family residence and gone to her father's place, that she was not entitled to any maintenance allowance prior to that date as she was being supported by the family till that time, that the defendant would be glad to welcome her in the family residence and that it was not necessary, in the circumstances, to allot her a separate house for her residence.