KOZHIPURATH KUNHIKRSIHNA MENON KURNAVAN Vs. KOZHIPURATH KUNHIKAVAMMA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The karnavan and the senior Anandravan of the defendants tarwad are the appellants before us. The plaintiffs are a Nair lady and her children who are members of the defendants tarwad. The plaintiffs sued for arrears of maintenance. The defence was that as the plaintiffs were living away from the tarwad house, though under the protection of the 1st plaintiffs husband, they are not under the Marumakkathayam law entitled to claim separate maintenance. The lower Appellate Court overruled this plea and hence the second appeal.

(2.) The learned District Judge has thus summarised the law : "A junior member is entitled to maintenance in the tarwad house, or, if he or she show good reason for living away from it, outside the tarwad house. That is the substantive rule, and various adjective reasons have been grouped round it, such as insufficient accommodation or family quarrels. No special sanctity attaches to these reasons apart from, the rule, and as obsetved in Maradevi v. Pammakka (1911) I.L.R. 36 M. 203, the list of good reasons is not yet exhausted. This latest is that to be found in Muthu Amma v. Gopalan (1912) I.L.R. 36 M 593, which is pertinent to the present case and where it is ruled that a good reason of absence for a wife who claims maintenance is living with her husband. The absurdity of attaching sanctity to old reasons, and cavilling at new would be plain if one imagined a woman denied her maintenance under Muthu Amma v. Gopalan (1912) I.L.R. 36 M. 593, for making a home for her husband but obtaining it under Peru Nair v. Ayyappan Nair (1880) I.L.R 2 M. 282, by a subsequent quarrel with her uncle.

(3.) Dr. Pandalai, the learned Counsel for the appellants contended (a) that though a female member s living with her husband might be a proper reason for her living away from the tarwad house, her right to claim separate maintenance is nevertheless subject to the condition that the husband is unable to maintain her and her children : (b) that though in North Malabar, living with the husband might be a proper reason for living away from the tarwad house and claiming separate maintenance it was not so in South Malabar where the defendants tarwad is situate : (c) that the 1st plaintiff must, by living with her husband who is well able to support her, be deemed to have waived, when she so went to live with her husband, all claims for maintenance against her tarwad, at least during the period of her residence with her husband. (Though there are so many as 17 grounds entered in the memorandum of second appeal, they are either repetitions of the above three contentions or relate to contentions not argued before us).