The husband in a suit by the second wife for separate residence and maintenance is the appellant in the Civil Miscellaneous Appeal. He had already married one Pattammal as his first wife. There were disputes between him and his first wife. The first wife obtained a decree for maintenance against the defendant. Subsequently, there was a rapprochement between the first wife and the defendant and the first wife came and joined her husband, while the plaitniff was living with him. The plaintiff’s case is that the defendant joined his first wife Pattammal and drove her out of the house after treating her cruelly and removing the jewels from her and this incident happened on the Sivarathri Day in 1944, and that she was threatened that she would be beaten if she came and joined. The defendant denied any cruel treatment or refusal to maintain the plaintiff and stated that the suit was instituted as he had patched up his differences with his first wife and she had come and joined him and that the suit was at the instance of the plaintiff’s father, who is stated to be a wealthy man and who was insisting that the defendant should settle some property on his daughter as the defendant