Court: Criminal act against husband voids wife's support

The Allahabad High Court has established a significant legal precedent, ruling that a wife is ineligible for financial maintenance if her own actions or those of her relatives directly cause her husband's incapacitation and inability to earn.

This decision came as the High Court dismissed a revision petition filed by a woman seeking financial support from her husband, who practices homeopathy. The husband's professional life was severely impacted after he was allegedly shot by his father-in-law and brother-in-law during an altercation at his clinic. Evidence presented confirmed that the husband sustained life-altering injuries, with a pellet still lodged in his spinal cord, posing a risk of paralysis if removed.

Presiding Justice Lakshmi Kant Shukla upheld a Kushinagar family court's prior ruling. He emphasized that awarding maintenance under these unique circumstances, where the husband's livelihood was destroyed by the criminal conduct of the claimant's immediate family, would be a grave miscarriage of justice. The court cannot ignore the reality that the wife's kin caused the husband's disability, thereby disqualifying her from claiming support.