1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD CRIMINAL WRIT PETITION NO. 213 OF 2002 Malhari s/o Shankar Tagad, Aged 40 years, Occupation Agriculture and Labour, Resident of 1182, Juna Dane Dabra, Near Jadhav Garage, Ahmednagar, District Ahmednagar Petitioner V E R S U S 1. The State of Maharashtra 2. Shobha w/o Malhari Tagad, Aged 30 years, Occupation Household and Labour, Resident of Nimbe Nandur, Taluka Shevgaon, District Ahmednagar Respondents Mr. S.L. Bhapkar, Advocate for the petitioner Mr. S.G. Nandedkar, APP for the respondent No.1 / State Mr. S.V. Natu, Adv h/f Mr. K.N. Lokhande, Advocate for respondent No.2 CORAM : A.V. NIRGUDE, J. DATED : 20th October, 2010 ORAL JUDGMENT 1. This Writ Petition filed in order to challenge the Judgment and order passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Ahemadnagar, dated 16th February, 2002, granting enhancement in the amount of maintenance awarded to the respondent. There is checkered history to the impugned order. 2 2. The respondent admittedly is legally wedded wife of the petitioner and it is already held earlier that she was entitled to maintenance from the petitioner. Prior to the year 2000, she had made an application under Section 125 of Cr. P.C. against the petitioner and secured an order directing the petitioner to pay her maintenance of Rs.300/- per month. In the year 2000 or so, she made an application under Section 127 of Cr. P.C. for enhancement of the maintenance amount. She, this time, demanded Rs.1500/- per month towards maintenance. The petitioner opposed the application, but the learned Judicial Magistrate, First Class, allowed the respondent’s application and enhanced the maintenance to the tune of Rs.500/- per month. The respondent / wife was not happy with this order and she preferred a revision before the revisional Court. After hearing both the sides, the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Ahmednagar, as said above, passed the impugned order and enhanced the amount of maintenance from Rs. 500/- p.m. to Rs.900/- p.m. This enhancement was made effective from 4th April, 2000. As against this order, present Writ Petition is filed in July, 2002. 3. The learned Advocate appearing for the petitioner asserted that both the Courts below wrongly held that the petitioner was a businessman and has income of over Rs. 1,00,000/- per year. He asserted that it is all along the case of the petitioner that he was working as labour at Market Committee compound, Ahmednagar. However, the evidence that came before the trial Court was of one Nanasaheb, who deposed that he was in the employment of the Market Committee and that a Gala in the Market Committee yard was purchased in the name of the petitioner. He also stated 3 that the petitioner paid contribution to the tune of Rs. 23,000/- during the financial year 1988-89 to the Market Committee indicating that he had done business to the tune of Rs.1,20,000/-. This witness however added that the business in the Gala was looked after by the applicant’s father. Taking clue from this admission, the petitioner’s Advocate asserted that the business belonged to the petitioner’s father and he is only an ostensible owner of the Gala. He tried to suggest that the petitioner’s case that he is working only as a labour should have been believed. 3. The Courts below refused to accept this argument and held that it was the applicant who has been doing business from the Gala. The petitioner did not bring on record anything to show that his father did not allow him to enter the Gala or that he was separated from his father and that his father had not shared any income derived in the business run from the Gala. Even otherwise, the petitioner is practically debarred from challenging the finding recorded by the trial Court that the petitioner was a businessman and was doing business from the above mentioned Gala, because the petitioner did not challenge this finding in the revisional Court. In view of this, the Writ Petition should fail. The Writ Petition stands dismissed. ( A.V. NIRGUDE, J. ) SRM/criwp/213/02/201010/ok