The main legal point established in the judgment is that an order of maintenance affects the right of a person drastically and substantially, hence, it cannot be treated as an interlocutory order and criminal revision should be preferred under Section 19(4) of the Family Courts Act against the order passed on the application for interim maintenance by the Family Court.

JUDGMENT :

(Rakesh Kainthla, J.)

The present petition has been filed under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. against the order dated 8.8.2022, passed by the learned Principal Magistrate, Family Court, Hamirpur, Circuit at Nadaun in Cr.MA No. 104 of 2021, under Section 125(3) of Cr. P.C., vide which the application filed by the respondent was allowed and interim maintenance of Rs.6500/- per month along with litigation charges of Rs.8500/- were awarded in her favour.

2. When the matter was listed, an objection was raised that the petition under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. would not be maintainable against the order passed by the Principal Judge, Family Court.

3. I have heard Mr. K.S. Gill, learned Counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Atharv Sharma, learned Counsel for the respondent.

4. Mr. K.S. Gill, learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the learned Principal Judge, Family Court had awarded interim maintenance, which is not a final order and no appeal or revision lies against the same. The petitioner has no remedy except to file a petition under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. Therefore, he submitted that the petition is fully maintainable.

5. Mr. Atharv Sharma, learned counsel for the respondent submitted that the petition should have been filed under Section 19(4) of the Family Courts Act and not under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. Therefore, he prayed that the present petition be dismissed as not maintainable.

6. I have given considerable thought to the submissions at the bar and have gone through the record carefully.

7. In Ashu Jain Vs. State of U.P. and others 2023 STPL 10374 Allahabad a petition was filed under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. to quash the order passed by Family Court. It was held by Allahabad High Court that an aggrieved person has to file a petition under Section 19 against an order passed by the Principal Judge, Family Court and a petition under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. is not maintainable. It was observed:-

“16. Section 19 of the Act, 1984 clearly provides about the provision of appeal or revision only against the order or decree of the Family Court. The law is settled that special law shall prevail over the general law. Therefore, in light of the provision under Section 19 of the Act, 1984, the only remedy before the applicant is to file a revision under Section 397 Cr.P.C. in case the matter doesn’t fall within the exceptions provided by the Apex Court in the matter of Dhariwal Tobacco Products Ltd.(Supra) as well as Prabhu Chawla (Supra).

17. A similar matter was before the Uttarakhand High Court in Ashu Dhiman (supra) and the Court has taken the same view. The relevant paragraph of the aforesaid judgment is quoted hereinbelow:

“17. In view of the definition of the interlocutory order and the ratio of the judgment supra, this Court is of the view that an order passed under Proviso to sub-section (1) of Section 125 of Cr.P.C. rejecting or allowing an application for maintenance, pending proceedings, is not an interlocutory order which adjudicates the rights of the parties to some extent. The revision under Section 397 of Cr.P.C. is maintainable. It has been held that such an order is amenable to revisional jurisdiction of this Court. The powers of the High Court under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. are inherent in nature and could be exercised where the statutory remedy of appeal and revision under the Cr.P.C. is not available. Thus, in view of the findings recorded above that revision against such an order is maintainable, an application under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. would not be maintainable. The core issue framed by this Court to deal with the controversy is answered accordingly. Since the criminal misc. applications filed by the applicant(s) under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. are not maintainable, the applicant(s) would be at liberty to avail the remedy of filing revision if so advised.

18. Again this issue was the subject matter before the Madhya Pradesh High Court in Rajendra Kumar (Supra) and the view of the Court was again the same. The relevant par