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Sivasankaran Gopalan   08 June 2022

Claim for maintenance after mutual consent divorce?

In case of mutual consent of the party has signed the affidavit submitted to the court with terms and conditions that he/she will not claim for maintenance in future. My question is "is there any possibility/provision in law that a wife can still claim for maintenance although mutual consent divorce is granted by court with agreed terms and conditions?

 

 

 



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 3 Replies

Advocate Bhartesh goyal (advocate)     08 June 2022

No,

As per sec 125 ( 4 ) Cr.P.C no wife shall be entitled to recover an allowance from her husband under this sec if she is living in adultery or if without any sufficient reason she refused to live with her husband or if they are living separately by mutual consent

So as per above provision wife can not claim maintenace from her ex - husband.

Sravika Reddy Kohir   08 June 2022

Hello Sivasankaran Gopalan, I acknowledge your question. The provision for maintenance of divorced wife is given under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure,1973. Under this section there are few grounds wherein the wife can be refused for maintenance they include

1.      The wife must not be living in adultery

2.      She must not refuse without sufficient reasons to live with her husband

3.      And she should not live separately by mutual consent

Under this it is given that a divorced wife cannot be considered as a wife living separately by mutual consent because the former status is due to dissolution of marriage. And in your scenario where the divorce was by mutual consent and both the parties have decided under the agreement that the wife shall not claim for maintenance, likewise when by mutual consent wife stood down on her maintenance she cannot claim for the same later on.

I hope I answered your query, if you still have any query, you can drop here.

Have a good day.

Sivasankaran Gopalan   13 June 2022

Sir,

But I read one judgement (https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/wife-can-seek-maintenance-even-after-agreeing-not-to-claim-it-bombay-hc-118122700680_1.html) where corurt says mutual consent divorce terms and conditions are "private" contract and there is no legal binding. Can you please clarify?


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