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Authored by - Ambika Swain (Intern at Legal Soch Foundation)
Meta Description: The news deals with the maintenance claim for the senior citizens who are unable to maintain themselves under various acts of law.
Keywords: Maintenance, Statutory Provisions, Family Court, Children, CrPC
The Kerala High Court held that it will not put a barrier for the courts from allowing past maintenance claim in favour of the senior citizens if there is lack or shortage of particular statutory provisions.
The Kerala High Court had Justice A. Muhamed Mustaque and Justice Sophy Thomas who were in the division bench for this case. They stated that the law is not stopping senior citizens from asking for past maintenance claims from their children if there is lack of statutory provisions to seek maintenance retrospectively.
The court mentioned these particular lines for the scenario of parents who do not go to court to ask for these claims from their children because of self-respect and parents showing patience cannot be a valid reason to stop them from claiming their past maintenance - "If the law entitles a senior citizen in old age the claim for maintenance prospectively, it does not mean the law nuggets the claim for past maintenance. A man with self-respect might have resisted himself in approaching the court at first instance on a belief that is children would respect his needs. His patience and respect for the children cannot be encashed to deny his claim for past maintenance".
There was one case where the Family Court denied the maintenance claim to a Christian senior citizen because of the religion he belonged to but later on it was observed that the courts have taken the rights of senior citizens into consideration and senior citizens can ask for maintenance irrespective of whatever religion they belong to.
If we look into the matter in a retrospective manner, the court held that there were no legislations at the first place for seeking past maintenance but can be claimed prospectively under the ambit of Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act. A father or a mother can also ask for maintenance from the date of the application or date of the order under Section 125 of CrPC.
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