Payment of school fees not an excuse for not paying maintenance for child: Karnataka HC

The man was earlier booked in a dowry demand and domestic violence case on his wife’s complaint.

The man argued before the high court that he was earning only Rs 30,000 a month and that paying Rs 10,000 would be onerous, adding that he had been paying the child’s school fees since 2022.

While he also argued that his wife was employed by a tech company, her counsel submitted that she had quit the job at the husband’s insistence to take care of the child and that the sum was not so exorbitant for him.

The bench observed, “It is the duty of the husband to maintain the wife and the child and not to wash his hands from the responsibility of maintenance. The payment of the fees, paid that is by the petitioner, would not mean that the husband would not pay maintenance for the child, for living. Payment of the fees is altogether different responsibility apart from the husband paying maintenance to maintain a child.”

The Chitradurga court order was passed in January 2021.