Graduate Wife Cannot Be Compelled To Work: Delhi High Court (image-pixabay)

The Delhi High Court said that wife holding a graduate degree cannot be compelled to work nor can be assumed that the decision to not to work as a deliberate ploy to seek maintenance from her estranged husband.

This remark was made by the court in response to a petition filed by a man who was seeking a reduction in his wife’s monthly interim maintenance. Her initial maintenance was set at Rs 25,000 but he sought to reduce it to Rs 15,000, citing that his wife is a BSc graduate.

The bench stated, “No inference can be drawn that merely because the wife is holding a degree of graduation, she must be compelled to work. It can also not be presumed that she is intentionally not working solely with an intent to claim interim maintenance from the husband.”

By refusing to reduce the interim maintenance, a division bench of Justice Suresh Kumar Kait and Justice Neena Bansal Krishna said that the wife’s graduate status was undisputed, but she was never employed and thus does not have any income.

Justice Neena Bansal Krishna emphasised that it is not appropriate to deduce that a wife is obligated to work merely because she holds a bachelor degree.

But the court also declined wife’s request to increase the interim amount, as if found no valid grounds for such a request. The family court has already taken into account the wife and their son’s expenses in a reasonable manner.

The court also fined  Rs 1000 on the husband for delaying the payment of interim maintenance and ordered that an interest at a rate of 6 per cent per annum to be paid to the wife as compensation for the delay in receiving the interim maintenance, reports Times of India.

But the court set aside the penalty of Rs 550 per day imposed on delay in payment of litigation cost.