‘It seems Kali Yug has arrived,’ says Allahabad HC judge as elderly couple fights a maintenance dispute

Lucknow: A legal dispute between a couple in their 80s over the quantum of maintenance payments prompted the judge hearing the case to observe that the 'Kali Yug' (a Sanskrit term for the fourth and final age of the Hindu cycle, also known as the Age of Doom and described as a time of darkness, vice, misery, strife and hypocrisy) had apparently dawned.

“It seems Kali Yug has arrived,” Justice Sourav Shyam Shamsheri observed while hearing the petition of 80-year-old Munesh Kumar Gupta challenging the family court's order ordering him to pay Rs 5,000 as maintenance to his wife Gayatri Devi.

While adjourned the matter to a later date, Judge Shamsheri expressed hope that the couple would appear before the court at the next hearing with a constructive compromise.

Munesh, a retired fourth class employee in the health department, said in his petition that he had bought a house in his wife's name in 1981. The dispute started after his wife gifted the house to his younger son in 2008.

Due to differences of opinion between Munesh and his wife, he was forced to leave the house and live in rented accommodation with his elder son.

The wife approached the family court and demanded maintenance from Munesh. The family awarded her maintenance of Rs 5,000.

Munesh alleged that he and his eldest son were evicted from the house and that even after that he had to pay Rs 2,000 to his wife every month from his pension, which was nearly Rs 14,000.

Published 25 September 2024, 12:18 IST