Court No. - 49
Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 6455 of 2018 Applicant :- Dharampal Singh Opposite Party :- State Of U.P. And Anr Counsel for Applicant :- Jitendra Singh,Virendra Singh Tomar Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.
Hon'ble Saumitra Dayal Singh,J.
Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the record.
This application U/s 482 Cr.P.C has been filed to challenge the order dated 25.11.2017 passed on the application under Section 125 Cr.P.C., by which the Court below has directed for monthly maintenance allowance @ Rs. 5,000/- per month to the opposite party no.2 from the date of application being 26.03.2012. Earlier, the matter had been directed to proceed exparte against which the applicant had filed an application under Section 126(2) Cr.P.C. However that application had been rejected vide order dated 01.11.2017.
Presently, learned counsel for the applicant submits that the award of monthly maintenance allowance @ Rs. 5,000/- per month from the date of application is excessive and arbitrary. He submits that the applicant has no stable source of income, therefore, the award of maintenance allowance is excessive.
Perusal of the order impugned in the present proceeding reveals that the opposite party no.2 had led evidence to establish that the applicant had sufficient agricultural holding from which he had derived income of Rs. 8,00,000/- per annum. Over and above, the applicant was running a dairy business from which he was deriving Rs. 10,000/- per month. Besides the applicant was claimed to be deriving income by working as a manual labourer. Nothing was brought on record to doubt the correctness of the finding recorded by the court below as to the financial status of the applicant.
Thereafter, it has been submitted that the learned court below has erred in awarding the monthly maintenance allowance from the date of application, whereas it should have made from the date of order.
Insofar as the order has been made for payment of maintenance amount from the date of application, I do not find any error in the same in view of the fact that the application had been filed by the opposite party on 26.03.2012, which ought to have been decided within a period of 60 days from that date. However, the same has been decided more than 68 months from the date when such application was filed.
The opposite parties have not received any amount towards maintenance as had been claimed by them and which under law, they were entitled to. Also, even upon amount as claimed becoming payable they have not become entitled to any interest for the inordinate delay. The cost of such delay, if at all has to be borne by one party, it has to be the applicant herein and not the opposite parties/claimant especially, when the law created an expectation for the application to be decided within sixty days of it being filed. Therefore, in my view the award of the maintenance from the date of application does not suffer from any infirmity.
Insofar as the applicant has prayed for time to make good the deficiency of deposit, looking into the facts it does appear that the applicant is a former, the ends of justice would be met, if the applicant is allowed some time to make such deposit.
Accordingly, the instant application is disposed of with the following directions:
1. Subject to the applicant furnishing adequate security to the satisfaction of the court below in the shape of other than cash or bank guarantee by 31.03.2018, further coercive measures adopted against the applicant shall remain stayed, subject to other conditions provided herein.
2. The applicant shall continue to deposit the monthly maintenance allowance from the period from March, 2018 onwards as and when it becomes due, in the manner provided by the court below under the impugned award.
3. The applicant shall further deposit Rs. 20,000/- towards maintenance allowance for the period November, 2017 to February, 2018 on or before 30.03.2018.
4. Subject to the applicant having complied with the above, the amount of Rs. 3,40,000/- (approximately) arrears of maintenance allowance for the period from the date of application till the date of order shall be deposited in seven instalments, such instalments being payable on or before 30.04.2018, 30.06.2018, 31.08.2018, 31.10.2018, 31.12.2018, 28.02.2019 and 30.04.2019 respectively. The first six instalments would be of Rs. 50,000/- each while the seventh/last instalment would be for the balance amount.
The amount so deposited by the applicant shall be released to the opposite parties no. 2 forthwith.
However, it is made clear that in the event of failure on part of the applicant to comply with any part of the order, coercive measures be revived from that stage without any further reference to this Court and recoveries be made first from the security, if any, offered by the applicant in compliance of this order.
Disposed of.
Order Date :- 26.2.2018 Lbm/-