The child’s school fee does not amount to maintenance unless the court mentions so,” the metropolitan magistrate court in Borivli has said. The observation was made while hearing a 31-year-old woman’s plea, seeking a warrant against her husband for not paying maintenance to her and their son. The magistrate further observed that the maintenance amound is for domestic use and not for any other expenses, unless mentioned in the court order.

The woman had filed a domestic violence (DV) case against her husband and in-laws in the Borivli metropolitan magistrate court in September 2017. Since getting married in 2008, they subjected her abuse and physical torture, she alleged. In 2016, the woman moved out of their in-laws’ with their son and filed a case under various Sections of Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 a year later.