1 WP.4549/2010 mnm IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE CIVIL JURISDICTION WRIT PETITION NO.4549 OF 2010 Kamlesh Umarshi Gala ...Petitioner Vs. Priti Kamlesh Gala nee Priti Virji Nissar ...Respondent Mr. Rajesh Kachare for Petitioner Mr. Madhav Jamdar for Respondent CORAM : SMT. ROSHAN DALVI, J. DATED : 30TH SEPTEMBER, 2010 P.C. : 1. Rule, returnable forthwith. 2. The husband has challenged the interim maintenance of Rs.8000/- granted to the wife and Rs.4000/- granted to his child. He claims that his business was closed down because of the stress he suffered from the strained relationship with his wife. He took up odd jobs and later on one permanent job with his relative which has also ended because he could not attend to the job on account of the strain. 3. The husband was admittedly a businessman to begin with. The parties had disputes. The wife left her matrimonial home to live with her parents. The husband contends that she left home unreasonably and without any cause. The wife contends that that was with just cause. This aspect would have to 2 WP.4549/2010 be determined at the final hearing of the divorce petition filed by the husband. 4. After the wife left the house and when the parties were not together to have any disputes, the husband’s business is stated to have ceased resulting into odd jobs. 5. The wife contends that the husband is still continuing in two businesses. One is the retail business of cloth and the other is the business of estate agency. The wife has shown the retail business of cloth from the husband’s income tax returns which show retail cloth sales in the last returns for the year ended 31st March 2010 filed as late as on 25th August 2010. The profit and loss account of the husband’s business filed by him with the income tax returns shows income from business of retail cloth. 6. The wife has shown the brokerage business also from the husband’s income tax returns essentially for the year ended 2007. Both these returns inter alia show salaries to which my specific attention has been drawn. The profit and loss account annexed to the husband’s income tax returns debiting the salaries, as rightly contended by Mr. Jamdar, shows that the husband had some staff to whom he paid salaries in the conduct of his business. 7. Whereas the sale of retail cloth is shown to be Rs.3,05,865/- the salaries and bonus paid by the husband is to the extent of Rs.63,650/-. The husband is unmistakably a businessman. 3 WP.4549/2010 8. The estate agency business is shown by the wife from certain advertisements given by the husband in Mumbai Samachar for the year 2008 to 2010. The advertisements show the telephone numbers of the husband as well as his father. A certain advertisement shows the husband’s photograph. Mr. Jamdar contended that after this fact was brought to the notice of the Family Court Judge, the advertisement in the newspaper of the next month being September 2010 was changed to show the photograph of the husband’s father instead. 9. It is settled position in law that the income shown in the income tax returns, though a pointer to certain facts, cannot be taken as gospel truth. The husband’s income tax returns show both his businesses though for certain years she has shown his estate agency business and for certain years his commercial business in his tax returns. 10.The amount of maintenance of Rs.8000/- for the wife and Rs.4000/- for the child is the minimum amount that could be granted for the maintenance of the wife and child of a businessman having two businesses. 11.There is no material irregularity in the order. 12.Writ Petition is dismissed. Rule is discharged. (SMT. ROSHAN DALVI, J.)