2025:DHC:5114 · CRL.REV.P.(MAT.) 172/2024 · Delhi High Court · Judgment delivered on 01.07.2025 · Before Dr. Swarana Kanta Sharma, J. · Interprets Rajnesh v. Neha, (2021) 2 SCC 324
The Ruling in One Line
Ad-interim maintenance is not interchangeable with interim maintenance under Rajnesh v. Neha; it can be granted even without a formal application on the strength of the respondent’s admitted income, but it takes effect only from the date of the order — not the date of filing.
The petition arose from a Family Court order directing the husband to pay ₹6,000/- per month as ad-interim maintenance to the wife under Section 125 Cr.P.C. — and to pay it retrospectively, from the date she filed her application. The husband challenged both the grant and, separately, the retrospective start date. The High Court upheld the grant but struck down the retrospective element, drawing a sharp line between two kinds of “temporary” relief that practitioners had been treating as one.
₹6,000
Ad-interim maintenance per month, based on the wife’s admitted salary of ₹17,907/-. Paras 5, 43
4
Issues framed by the Court for determination — from the interim/ad-interim distinction to the payment start date. Para 10
4–6
Months within which Rajnesh v. Neha says interim maintenance applications should ordinarily be decided. Para 35
0
Formal applications required for ad-interim maintenance — none, per this ruling. Para 37, 44
How It Started: A Marriage, a Departure, and Two Competing Accounts
The parties married in April 2016 at Jhajjar, Haryana; no children were born of the marriage. The husband works as a medical representative in the private sector; the wife has studied up to Class 12 and, on his case, runs a beauty parlour from her home. The two accounts of the breakdown diverge sharply.
The husband’s version: the wife left the matrimonial home in May 2021 with all her belongings, following an earlier year-long departure in 2020 during which she claimed no maintenance. After he filed for restitution of conjugal rights, she responded, in his telling, with a string of criminal and civil proceedings against him and his family.
The wife’s version: her in-laws tortured her, physically and mentally, including over dowry and stridhan; she returned to the matrimonial home in 2020 only on a promise of better treatment, which was not kept; she was eventually thrown out in May 2021 and came to Delhi to live with her parents.
She filed for maintenance under Section 125 Cr.P.C. in July 2022. While that application was still pending, the Family Court passed two orders now under challenge: one dated 24.05.2024 granting her ₹6,000/- per month as ad-interim maintenance from the date of filing, based on the husband’s admitted income of ₹17,907/- per month; and one dated 26.09.2024 rejecting his objections and directing him to clear the arrears, having not paid a rupee in the interim.
The Questions Before the Court
The husband’s central plank was that the Family Court had misread Rajnesh v. Neha — treating ad-interim maintenance as though it were interim maintenance, and mechanically applying a judgment that, on his reading, only governs the latter. Four questions fell for determination:
- Can ad-interim maintenance be equated with interim maintenance — and if not, what separates the two?
- Does Rajnesh v. Neha actually cover the grant of ad-interim maintenance at all?
- Can ad-interim maintenance be granted where no specific application for it was ever filed?
- Is ad-interim maintenance payable from the date the application was filed, or only from the date of the order granting it?
Why It Matters
“Ad-interim” and “interim” sound the same — the court says they are not, and collapsing them erases the entire point of ad-interim relief
The husband argued that the absence of a Rajnesh v. Neha-style application — a concise petition accompanied by a full Affidavit of Disclosure of Assets and Liabilities — meant no ad-interim maintenance should have been ordered at all. The Court’s answer inverts the premise: that gap is exactly what ad-interim relief exists to bridge, not a bar to granting it.
The terms ‘interim’ and ‘ad-interim’ are not interchangeable, either in purpose or in their procedural context… ad-interim maintenance serves as an immediate relief, which can be awarded at an earlier stage, i.e. even before deciding the application for interim maintenance — which can take some months or at times years — purely to prevent immediate financial distress of the claimant.
Para 34
Case Lineage: How Rajnesh v. Neha Narrowed, but Did Not Erase, Kusum Sharma
This is the ratio the whole judgment turns on. The Kusum Sharma v. Mahinder Kumar Sharma line of decisions (2014–2020) had permitted courts to grant ad-interim maintenance on the respondent’s admitted income even before affidavits were filed. Rajnesh v. Neha (2021) then mandated a formal Affidavit of Disclosure of Assets and Liabilities alongside the maintenance application. The question was whether that later ruling swept away the earlier ad-interim framework entirely — and the Court holds that it did not.
| Case | What it held |
|---|---|
| Rajesh Chaudhary v. Nirmala Chaudhary, (2006) 86 DRJ 61 | Where disposal of a maintenance application is delayed, ad-interim maintenance may be ordered on the respondent’s own admitted liability. (Para 20) |
| Kusum Sharma v. Mahinder Kumar Sharma (I–V, 2014–2020) | Directions consolidated: if admitted income is on record (e.g. a salary slip), the court may fix ad-interim maintenance even before affidavits are filed; if a party delays or files a defective affidavit, ad-interim maintenance may still be granted after hearing both sides. (Paras 21–24) |
| Manish Divedi v. Jyotsana, 2019 SCC OnLine Del 10492 | Ad-interim maintenance is a tentative arrangement requiring only a prima facie opinion — distinct from a final determination of interim or permanent maintenance. (Para 13) |
| Rajnesh v. Neha, (2021) 2 SCC 324 | Mandated a concise application for interim maintenance with an Affidavit of Disclosure of Assets and Liabilities — overruling Kusum Sharma to the extent it dispensed with that requirement for interim maintenance. Silent on ad-interim maintenance altogether. (Paras 27, 33) |
| Naveen Kumar v. Kavita, 2025:DHC:5114 (this judgment) | Holds that Rajnesh v. Neha narrowed Kusum Sharma only for interim maintenance; the ad-interim framework survives and continues to govern the field. (Paras 27–28, 37) |
Legal Foundations: No Application Needed — But No Retrospective Payment Either
Working through the four framed issues, the Court’s analysis splits two ways — two answers favour the wife, two favour the husband.
Interim vs. ad-interim
Not interchangeable. Interim maintenance follows full pleadings and disclosure; ad-interim maintenance is a tentative, prima facie relief granted earlier, to bridge the delay before interim maintenance is decided. (Paras 11–13, 35–36)
Does Rajnesh v. Neha cover ad-interim maintenance?
No. That judgment is silent on ad-interim relief; it only overruled Kusum Sharma‘s procedure for interim maintenance. The Kusum Sharma framework for ad-interim relief continues to apply. (Paras 27–28, 33)
Is a formal application required?
No. Insisting on a separate application would defeat the protective purpose of Section 125 — the court can grant ad-interim maintenance on the facts of the case, following Inder Singh v. Sumitra, 2019 SCC OnLine Del 9485. (Paras 30, 44)
From what date is it payable?
From the date of the order — not the date of filing. Backdating ad-interim relief would impose a financial burden without full judicial examination, and would collapse the very distinction the judgment draws. (Paras 39–42, 45)
A Word of Caution: Not a Matter of Routine
The Court was careful not to turn ad-interim maintenance into an automatic entitlement. It is discretionary, and meant only for genuine, demonstrated hardship where the interim maintenance application itself is likely to be delayed — not a shortcut around the disclosure discipline that Rajnesh v. Neha built for interim maintenance proper.
It must be clarified that ad-interim maintenance is not to be granted as a matter of routine in every case. It is a discretionary relief, to be exercised judiciously by the Court only where the facts and circumstances so warrant.
Para 29
The Outcome: Upheld in Substance, Trimmed at the Edges
Putting the analysis together, the Court found no error in the Family Court granting ad-interim maintenance during the pendency of the wife’s interim maintenance application, and held the ₹6,000/- figure — assessed against the husband’s admitted ₹17,907/- monthly income — neither excessive nor arbitrary. The absence of a formal application specifically seeking ad-interim relief did not taint the order either. But the direction to pay from the date of filing, rather than the date of the order, could not stand.
The two impugned orders were accordingly upheld to the extent they granted ₹6,000/- per month in ad-interim maintenance, but modified so that the amount runs from 24.05.2024 — the date of the first order — rather than from July 2022, when the maintenance application was filed. The revision petition was disposed of on these terms.
What This Means for Practice
- Do not assume a client seeking ad-interim maintenance must file a separate application — a prayer within the main petition, or even the bare facts on record, can suffice.
- Push back on any order that backdates ad-interim maintenance to the date of filing; per this ruling, it should run only from the date of the order.
- If the opposing party’s admitted income is already on record (salary slips, prior pleadings), use it — the court can act on it immediately, without waiting for the full affidavit of assets and liabilities under Rajnesh v. Neha.
- Don’t conflate the two regimes in drafting or argument: a submission that leans on Rajnesh v. Neha to resist ad-interim relief (or to demand full disclosure first) now has a direct answer in this judgment.
- Remember the ceiling: courts are cautioned against granting ad-interim maintenance routinely — be ready to show genuine urgency and hardship, not just delay.
Citations and paragraph references above are drawn from the judgment as summarised; please verify against the full text of 2025:DHC:5114, CRL.REV.P.(MAT.) 172/2024, before relying on them in filings.
Leave a Reply