BHANWARI BAI Vs. BHEROON LAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) MST. Bhanwari Bai instituted en application under Section 488 of the Code of Criminal Procedure against her husband Bheroon Lal craving for maintenance allowance on the ground that he neglected to maintain her despite his ability to do so and had married again; This was resisted by her husband and the City Magistrate. Bhilwara. allowed the application and fixed the allowance at the rate of Rs. 45/per month. Dissatisfied the husband preferred a revision before the Court of Sessions Judge. Bhilwara and prayed that the order of the City Magistrate be quashed. The wife also preferred a revision application praying that the maintenance allowance awarded toy the City Magistrate be enhanced. The learned Sessions Judge dismissed the petition filed by Smt. Bhanwari Bai and allowed that of the husband on the condition that the wife should live with her husband and in that case the husband shall have to maintain her according to his status and financial position Paving for all her needs, like residence, food, clothes and medical attendance. He was required to give a security in the sum of Rs. 2,000/- to the effect that he would not show any neglect in the discharge of his duties enjoined upon him. It was further ordered that in case he neglected to maintain his wife the security shall be forfeited and the forfeited amount of the security shall be paid to the wife and she will receive Rs. 45/- per month as maintenance allowance thereafter. He has accordingly made a reference benefit No. 100/71 dated 9. 2. 1971. Mst. Bhanwari Bai has preferred a Criminal Revision No. 513 of 1971. As the reference and the revision application relate to the same matter they can be conveniently disposed of together.

(2.) MR. P. C. Mathur. learned Counsel for the husband, in all fairness conceded and in my opinion rightly that the order under reference for security could not have been passed by the learned Sessions Judge. He. however, urged that the husband is still prepared to keep Mst. Bhanwari Bai and look after her health and no order for maintenance needs to be passed. Mr. Dalpat Singh Shishodia. learned Counsel for the wife argued that in these days of exorbitant prices a sum of Rs. 45/- was not enough to maintain a blind person and the maintenance allowance should be enhanced.

(3.) THE order of the learned Sessions Judge evidences his desire to place the husband as it were on probation of good conduct. vis-a-vis his wife Mst. Bhanwari Bai. The background of this case, briefly stated and not disputed be-for me is that Bheroon Lal and Mst. Bhanwari Bai were married some eight years ago. In 1967 when Mst. Bhanwari Bai became big with a child and on account of some complications she lost her vision. She was attended to by doctors, but without any success and her father removed her to his house. The husband says that he wanted her to return but as she did not come he was obliged to contract another marriage. In these circumstances is Mst. Bhanwari Bai not relieved of her obligation to render to her husband his conjugal rights? The answer has been even by me in Hemchand v. Mst. Prabhati Bai. 1962 Raj LW 488 in the affirmative. The admitted facts are that Bheroon Lal has another wife in addition to Mst. Bhanwari Bai. Bheroon Lai cannot insist on Mst. Bhanwari Bai now rendering to him his conjugal rights. She is relieved of that obligation on account of his having contracted another marriage. She is. therefore, entitled to a maintenance allowance as a matter of right.