ARPITA BHATTACHARJEE Vs. SUBRATA BHATTACHARJEE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this application made under Section 482 Cr. PC. the petitioner, who has been granted maintenance allowance at the rate of Rs. 2000 per month from the opposite party, has challenged the order, dated, February 5, 2004, passed by the learned Judicial Magistrate 1st Class, Agartala, West Tripura, in Misc. Case No. 186 of 2003, disallowing the petitioner's prayer to direct the S.D.O. (Civil) Sonamura, and/or the Director of Small Savings, Group Insurance, Government of Tripura, as employer of the opposite party, to deduct the maintenance amount of Rs. 2000 per month from the opposite party's salary and to remit, by way of bank draft, to the petitioner's Savings Bank Account No. 01190054280 maintained at the State Bank of India, Agartala Branch. Heard Dr. H.K. Bhattacharjee, learned counsel for the petitioner, and Mr. S.M. Chakraborty, learned counsel for the opposite party.

(2.) There is no dispute before this Court that by an order, dated August 5, 2002, passed in Misc. Case No. 65 or 2002, the revision petitioner, as wife of the opposite party, has been allowed maintenance allowance at the rate of Rs. 2000 per month from the opposite party. Claiming that the petitioner has been racing difficulty on account of, inter alia, delay in receiving payment of the maintenance allowance from the opposite party, the i petitioner sought for a direction as hereinabove aforementioned, but the same was disallowed by the impugned order.

(3.) The learned Court below has rejected the petitioner's prayer on the ground that Section 125 Cr. PC does not provide for making payment of maintenance allowance by way of bank draft as has been sought for by the petitioner. While dealing with this aspect of the matter, one has to bear in mind that the provisions of Section 125 Cr. PC are intended to fulfil a social purpose. Their object is to compel a man to perform the moral obligation, which he owes to society in respect of his wife and children. By providing a simple, speedy but limited relief Section 125 Cr. PC seeks to ensure that the neglected wife and children are not left beggared and destituted on the scrap heap of society and thereby driven to a life of vagrancy, immorality and crime for their subsistence. Thus, Section 125 Cr.PC is not intended to provide for a full and final determination of the status and personal rights of the parties. The jurisdiction conferred by Section 125 Cr. PC on the Magistrate is more in the nature of a preventive rather than a remedial jurisdiction; it is certainly not punitive (see AIR 1975 SC 83).