'Husband's duty to maintain wife, children': SC awards Rs 5 cr to woman

New Delhi: The Supreme Court said that a woman’s education or professional qualifications cannot absolve a husband of his matrimonial, paternal, moral, and legal duty to provide for his spouse and children, as it directed a man to pay Rs 5 crore as permanent alimony to the wife.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta termed the decade-long dispute between estranged spouses as “a matrimonial battle of Mahabharata”, while invoking Article 142 of the Constitution to dissolve the marriage as irretrievably broken down.

The court noted that there is no doubt that the marriage is dead for all practical purposes. It also terminated all proceedings initiated and pending inter se, including those against the relatives and legal counsels, ''in order to do complete justice and provide a quietus to this decade-long dispute which has crossed all limits and has assumed the status of a matrimonial battle of Mahabharata.”

In its judgment on April 7, 2026, the bench said, it goes without saying that maintenance, upbringing and the education of the son would require significant financial resources, especially considering today’s high cost of living and education.

"Thus, even if the appellant-wife is highly educated and professionally qualified, that by itself cannot be a reason to absolve the respondent-husband from his matrimonial, paternal, moral and legal responsibility to provide for his wife and children,” the court said.

The wife filed an appeal against the September 2024 order of the Bombay High Court, which refused to expedite the execution proceedings for the recovery of long-pending maintenance arrears arising from a protracted matrimonial dispute between the parties. The court also rejected the husband’s counterclaim of Rs 20 crore from the wife.

The bench noted that the parties have been embroiled in a long-drawn, bitter matrimonial strife, resulting in a multiplicity of litigations instituted across various courts and forums.

“The respondent-husband has, at every stage, tried to multiply and complicate the proceedings by filing innumerable applications and complaints not only against the appellant-wife and her relatives but also against her advocates. Most of these proceedings appear to be vindictive and vexatious,” the bench said.

The wife's counsel claimed the respondent-husband has misused his legal knowledge by filing over 80 legal proceedings against the appellant-wife, her family members, and even her legal counsels across various forums.

The bench said this clearly indicated a hostile, cantankerous and vindictive approach on part of the respondent-husband.

The court granted the appellant-wife absolute custody of both the sons with visitation rights to the husband.

The marriage was solemnised in January 2010. The couple had been living separately since October 2016, with two minor children in the custody of the wife.