The Kerala High Court recently upheld a woman’s right to claim maintenance under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (DV Act), despite an earlier agreement signed with her former husband waiving such right.

Justice A Badharudeen emphasised that any agreement between husband and wife which tries to waive the wife’s legal right to maintenance is not valid.

Citing precedents of the Supreme Court and the Kerala High Court, the judge reiterated that the statutory duty of a husband to provide maintenance to his wife or children under the DV Act cannot be avoided by any agreement.

“Thus the legal position is very clear on the point that when an agreement is entered into between the wife and the husband, as a part of compromise filed in the Court or otherwise, whereby the wife relinquishes or waives the right to claim maintenance in future from the husband, such an agreement is opposed to public policy and it does not preclude her from claiming maintenance. Therefore waiver or abandonment of right of maintenance by the wife would not negate the claim of maintenance by the wife or by the child/children.”

The woman had filed a petition under Section 20 of the DV Act before the magistrate, seeking various relief including interim maintenance under Section 23 of the Act. She stated that she had obtained a divorce from her former husband in 2018, following repeated demands from him for gold and money, which eventually escalated into acts of domestic violence. She claimed that she had no independent income and sought interim support, asserting that her former husband earned over ₹15 lakh per month.

The man claimed that his former wife had waived her right to maintenance in a notarised agreement executed on October 28, 2017, as part of the divorce settlement. He also alleged that she ran a yoga centre and was earning ₹2 lakh per month.

The magistrate, however, awarded the woman ₹30,000 as monthly interim maintenance, which was upheld in an appeal. Both courts rejected the man’s claims about her income and held that the notarised agreement could not take away her statutory right to seek maintenance.

Challenging these findings, the man approached the High Court.

After reviewing the facts and submissions, the Court observed that the notarised agreement did not explicitly provide for any payment towards maintenance. An agreement providing for waiver or relinquishment of maintenance was legally invalid, since it violated the statutory right to maintenance, the Court said.

It also emphasised that obligations under the DV Act, such as the right to maintenance, continue to survive even after a decree of divorce, ensuring that the spouse’s rights remain protected regardless of the dissolution of marriage.

The Court found the interim maintenance awarded by the magistrate to be reasonable and declined to interfere with the order.