MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Tuesday held that the right of divorced Muslim women to claim maintenance from their former husbands is unconditional and they can claim reasonable amounts from their exes even after remarriage.

The single judge bench of justice Rajesh Patil said that the word “remarriage” is missing from section 3(1)(a) of the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act (MWPA) 1986, under which divorced Muslim women are entitled to a reasonable and fair provision and maintenance from their former husbands.

“In other words, the Act seeks to prevent the destitution of Muslim women and ensure their right to lead a normal life even after divorce,” said justice Patil. “Hence the legislative intent of the Act is clear. It is to protect ‘all’ divorced Muslim women and safeguard their rights. The protection referred to in the MWPA is unconditional. Nowhere does the said Act intend to limit the protection that is due to the former wife on the grounds of her remarriage,” the judge added.

The judge said the essence of the MWPA is that a divorced woman is entitled to a reasonable and fair provision and maintenance regardless of her remarriage and the fact of divorce was in itself sufficient for the wife to claim maintenance under section 3(1)(a).

The entitlement of divorced Muslim women to a reasonable and fair provision and maintenance is crystallised on the date of divorce and is not hampered by the former wife’s remarriage, the court said while dismissing petition filed by a Chiplun resident.

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The bench dismissed petition filed by a Chiplun resident, who works in Saudi Arabia, challenging a May 18, 2017, order of the sessions court at Khed, which rejected his appeal against an order of a judicial magistrate first class, granting one time alimony to his former wife, whom he had divorced by a registered post on April 5, 2008.

The couple had married in 2005 and had a girl the next year. While the man worked in Saudi Arabia, the wife initially stayed with his parents in Chiplun in Ratnagiri district. Later, in June 2007 she shifted to her own parents’ home in Chiplun itself. The same year she filed a plea for maintenance for herself and her daughter.

The woman had invoked provisions of the MWPA to claim maintenance from her estranged husband and acting on her plea, the magistrate court had ordered him to pay her ₹4.32 lakhs. The sessions court too rejected his appeal and enhanced the maintenance amount to ₹9 lakhs.

The husband had then carried the matter to the high court, primarily contending that he was not liable to pay any maintenance to his ex-wife because she had remarried in the meanwhile.

Justice Patil rejected his plea observing that if such an argument was accepted and the husband is absolved of his duty on his ex-wife’s remarriage, then the husband would deliberately wait for his former wife to get remarried. “Such a condition is unfair and unacceptable and will frustrate the very essence of the said (MWPA) Act,” the judge said.