At Rs 150cr, alimony claim more than SC money

R. BALAJI

New Delhi, Sept. 25: A woman has sought Rs 150 crore in alimony from her estranged husband, prompting the Supreme Court to observe the amount was way larger than its annual budget of Rs 82 crore. “We will examine the matter at a later stage. The amount anyway is more than even our Supreme Court’s annual budget,” Chief Justice of India P. Sathasivam said, as he referred the dispute between an Indore couple to the Supreme Court Mediation Centre. The lawyers for the couple requested that their clients’ names be withheld because mediation was under way and there was a possibility of rapprochement. The couple have fallen out after 10 years of marriage. The husband, a businessman, is seeking a divorce on grounds of an irretrievable breakdown of marriage but his wife does not want one. This is possibly the first time a woman has sought in court such a huge amount for a full and final settlement of a maintenance suit. Generally, the amount varies between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 1 crore. In case of richer families, it ranges between Rs 5 crore and Rs 10 crore. The amount is far higher when the super-rich are involved but such cases are usually settled out of court. The claims are decided on the basis of the husband’s income, the wife’s earning capabilities and the requirements of children. In the case before the Supreme Court, the wife has claimed her husband has assets worth Rs 400 crore. But the husband has put it at a far lower Rs 67 lakh. His counsel told the top court: “Your lordship, I cannot pay such a huge amount. I don’t have such money as I am neither a Tata nor a Birla.” While the husband’s divorce suit was pending in an Indore court, the wife filed an FIR against him for allegedly assaulting her outside the court premises. Fearing arrest, he filed an anticipatory bail plea but a sessions court rejected it. After Madhya Pradesh High Court too rejected his appeal, he moved the apex court. The husband has also filed a petition seeking transfer of the matrimonial dispute and criminal case against him to Delhi. But the apex court referred the matrimonial dispute to the Supreme Court Mediation Centre, after which the couple agreed to mediation. In mediation, advocates try to convince couples to reconcile differences. If they succeed, the cases are quashed by court. In her maintenance suit, the wife claimed that her husband has stakes in several companies and put the value of his immovable assets at Rs 400 crore. But his neglect of her and their minor daughter in the past few years forced them to shift to her parental home in 2009, she said. Replying to the transfer suit filed by her husband, the wife said: “The present cost of the immovable properties of the applicant (husband) is more than Rs 400 crore. “Apart from these, the applicant has already purchased shares of other companies worth crores of rupees. The applicant and the members of his family are in the habit of enjoying high standard of life. The applicant had imported an Audi car… from Germany in the year 2005 and presently he has been utilising this Audi and other costly cars…. “The annual fees of the school of the minor daughter is Rs 150,000 and other annual expenses of the school at about Rs 50,000 are being incurred. “The non-applicant is not doing any job/profession and she does not have source of income. Looking to the life standard of the applicant and looking to his movable and immovable properties, it is necessary to award in lumpsum a sum of Rs 100 crore by way of permanent alimony/maintenance of the non-applicant herself and in lumpsum a sum of Rs 50 crore by way of permanent maintenance of her minor daughter, which the applicant is fully competent to pay. “Apart from these, it is also necessary to award to the nonapplicant the articles, jewellery etc., given to the nonapplicant by her mother, father, mother-in-law; father-in-law and the relatives at the time of her marriage.” Original NEWS Source:- http://www.telegraphindia.com/1130926/jsp/nation/story_17392857.jsp#.UkPQX9Kmhci