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Manmohan Gopal vs The State of Chhattisgarh & Anr.

Criminal Appeal · 2023 INSC 953Decided 20 Oct 2023
Criminal Appeal Nos. 85-86 of 2021
S. Ravindra Bhat · Aravind Kumar

Background

A woman (the applicant) had been awarded interim maintenance of about Rs. 1.27 lakh per month from her husband, who abandoned her, moved to Australia, obtained an ex-parte foreign divorce, and remarried, and thereafter refused to pay. The husband's parents (the petitioners in this application) had earlier been jailed for 10 months for failing to honour an undertaking to pay Rs. 40 lakh in arrears, and had consented to attachment of 11 shops belonging to the family to help satisfy the debt. Years later, with arrears grown to roughly Rs. 1.25 crore and multiple failed auctions of the attached shops, the applicant asked the Supreme Court to use its extraordinary power under Article 142 to finally give her the money or the property itself, since ordinary execution proceedings had completely failed.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court found that the husband and his father had persistently defied the Court's orders through delay and obstruction over several years. Invoking Article 142 (the power to pass any order necessary to do "complete justice"), the Court directed that six of the attached shops be sold by the Delhi High Court Registrar with proceeds credited to the applicant, that rent from the Fitness Factory Gym shop continue to be paid to her until the balance of the Rs. 1.25 crore is covered, and that if the amount is still not paid within a year, the applicant would get the choice of either taking ownership (via a court-executed conveyance) of the gym premises or having it auctioned, with all realized proceeds going to her.

Lesson Learnt

When a party persistently disobeys court orders to pay a maintenance debt and normal execution avenues (attachment, auction) repeatedly fail, the Supreme Court can use its Article 142 power to fashion a practical, final remedy, including directly transferring property to the person owed money, rather than leaving them remediless indefinitely.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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