Delhi court sends yoga guru to jail
https://www.hindustantimes.com/Delhi-court-sends-yoga-guru-to-jail/Article1-634815.aspx
A Delhi-based yoga guru, whose clientele includes political bigwigs to fashionistas, has been sent to jail for failing to pay maintenance to his former wife. According to a metropolitan magistrate court order in April 2010, Laviral (name changed) was required to pay Rs 35,000 per month in maintenance to his former wife. However, he failed to pay a “single penny all these months”.
The yoga guru got married to Sheila (name changed), daughter of a former vice-chief of the Indian Air Force, in 2004.
Soon after her marriage, Sheila accused her husband of trying to grab her parents’ properties in Defence Colony. She sought a divorce from him in 2008. The couple has a three-year-old son from their marriage. In April 2010, the court had found him adulterous by nature and imposed a maintenance of Rs 35,000 per month.
In October 2010, Sheila, through her counsel Prabhjit Jauhar, filed a complainant in the court, accusing the yoga guru of non-payment of maintenance.
“He has not paid a single penny to his wife and son even after the court orders of April 2010. He even failed to pay the arrears from the date of the divorce case filed in 2008,” Jauhar told the court. Earlier, the court had restrained Laviral from visiting his child, saying his “treacherous behaviour could influence the child”.
However, the counsel for Laviral argued that in the previous order, the court had not considered all aspects of the case and wrongly imposed the maintenance cost.
In the latest order, metropolitan magistrate Priya Mahendra observed that circumstances have remained unchanged for Sheila despite court orders giving her relief. The court, therefore, ordered civil imprisonment to Laviral for a month for failing to pay the maintenance amount since October 2009. “As per law, he could go to jail every month for delay in payment from October 2009 till date,” Jauhar told the Hindustan Times.
