1. Petitioner admittedly is the second wife of a government servant, namely, late Madan Mohan Prasad. The prayer in the writ application is for a direction upon the respondents to pay her family pension especially in view of the fact that the first wife never got family pension and she is dead now sometime in the year 2006. Verification with regard to status of the petitioner has been done by the respondent and there is no dispute that she was the second wife of the erstwhile employee. The hitch is that despite the above fact having been verified, the claim stands rejected in terms of Annexure-3. Contention of the counsel for the petitioner is that such a decision contrary to the actual state of affairs is a totally arbitrary decision obviously putting the life of the present petitioner at peril as she has no alternative to survival.

2. At the very outset, when the matter was taken up on the previous date, the stand of the State counsel was that there is no right of the petitioner to demand pension of any kind from the State authorities as the law does not recognize a second marriage of a Hindu. Pension can only accrue in accordance with rules and since a second marriage