A wife who voluntarily separates from her husband without sufficient cause is not entitled to maintenance under Section 125(4) of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

JUDGMENT :

(Subhash Chand, J.) :

1. This Criminal Revision has been preferred against the impugned judgment dated 14.06.2022 passed by the learned Principal Judge, Family Court, Dhanbad in Original Maintenance Case No.165 of 2022, whereby the petitioner-husband was directed to pay the maintenance amount of Rs.35,000/-per month to the opposite party No.2-wife, payable by 10th day of each succeeding month from the date of application i.e. 16.03.2022 and further direction was made to pay the arrears of amount within two months from the date of the order.

2. The brief facts leading to this Criminal Revision are that the maintenance petition was moved on behalf of the opposite party No.2-wife with these averments that she is legally wedded wife of petitioner-husband, namely, Dinesh Kumar Vishwakarma with whom her marriage was solemnized on 03.06.1995 under the Special Marriage Act, 1954. After the marriage, both lived together as wife-husband at Kamardhubi, Nirsa, Dhanbad. The opposite party No.2-wife has left the matrimonial house in the year 2011 and since then she has been residing at her parental house having no source of income to maintain her. The opposite party No.2-wife is dependent upon her parents, who are also not in a position to maintain her for a long period. The petitioner-husband is in service at IITDM, Jabalpur and has been drawing salary of Rs.3,00,000/-per month, where he is working on the post of Professor. Therefore, prayed to allow the maintenance amount of Rs.75,000/-per month for her maintenance.

3. On behalf of the petitioner-husband reply of the show cause notice was given with these averments that the petition for maintenance filed on behalf of the opposite party No.2-wife is not in a prescribed format as directed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Rajnish Vs. Neha & Anr. reported in (2021) 2 SCC 324. The opposite party No.2-wife was required to disclose her assets and liabilities, also the status of the parties and reasonable needs of the wife. Whether the opposite party No.2-wife is educated and professionally qualified? Whether she has any source of income sufficient to maintain her? The wife has been living separately from her husband at her own will without any sufficient reason and despite several requests made on behalf of the husband; she refused to live with him. The wife is able to maintain herself as she is an educated and well bodied lady. She is/was doing job of a Teacher in Carmel School, Dhanbad and earning more than Rs.30,000/-to 40,000/-per month from the said job. The wife had intentionally concealed this material fact and has not come with clean hands to claim for maintenance amount from her husband. Indeed on 24.05.2011, the wife in pre-planned way after having collected her jewelry, cash and other valuable items along with passport left the matrimonial house. The petitioner-husband himself went to the parental home of the wife many times to bring her back but she refused to come without any reasonable cause. The petitioner-husband never subjected her to cruelty as alleged. On the plea of cruelty, she had filed Original Suit No.531 of 2015 for dissolution of marriage against the petitioner-husband; the same suit was dismissed on 08.06.2018 by the competent court.

4. The petitioner-husband was married with the opposite party No.2-wife on 02.05.1995 at Kalyaneshwari Temple and the marriage was registered on 03.06.1995 under the Special Marriage Act, 1954. The opposite party No.2-wife has done skill course of Yoga, Music and Personality Development class in Banglore. She was working as a Lecturer in MES College, Banglore. She has done Japanese Language Course at Tsukuba in Japan and further she joined the laboratory of Professor Kouichi Murakami, Graduate School of Pune and Applied Sciences University of Tsukuba, Japan where she got employment as a Research Assistant with recommendations from the Host Professor Kiyoshi Asakawa of her husband-petitioner. The petitioner-husband also