Kerala High Court cites Bible to grant relief to Christian senior citizen

The Bible, the ideals enshrined in the Constitution of India, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) recently prompted the Kerala High Court to come to the aid of an 80-year-old senior citizen (petitioner), who had sought arrears of maintenance from his children..A family court had earlier rejected the Christian senior citizen’s plea on the ground that there was no law allowing a Christian to past maintenance.The High Court was initially inclined to agree with the family court’s stance, since the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 and Section 125 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) also only spoke of granting maintenance prospectively.However, a bench of Justices Muhamed Mustaque and Sophy Thomas reconsidered their initial opinion, after considering that law itself evolves from tradition, culture and the personal relations formed through the same.“Is it a requirement that to claim maintenance there should be a positive law? We find the reasons recorded hereafter that, to claim past maintenance positive law is not a prerequisite … Law is nothing but principles that are implicit in the relationships formed privately through practices, traditions and culture,” the Court reasoned..In a country where social order is defined by the practice of the community or that of one’s denomination and adherence to long-standing religious norms, the Court opined that it “will have to recognize those norms and precepts creating such relationship in that social order.”Looking at the case from this viewpoint, the bench found it fit to examine what the Bible, which governs the Christian faith of the senior citizen before the Court, says.“In Holy Bible it is written as: ‘Honor your father and mother’…”, the Court observed.The bench further noted that Article 25 of the UDHR declares that everyone has a right to adequate standard of living, in the event of sickness, disability, old age, etc.Similar duties were implicit in the Constitution of India, particularly Article 41, the Court added.“We cannot ignore the principles in a social order creating an obligation on the children to maintain their parents during old age,” the Court proceeded to emphasise..The Court further noted that legal scholar, Ronald Dworkin, had advocated for judges to interpret the law in line with the moral principles that are followed in society.The Court also explained that just because a law, like the 2007 Maintenance of Senior Citizens Act, entitled a senior citizen to claim maintenance prospectively, it did not mean that the law “negates” claims for past maintenance..In the present case, the Court mused that perhaps the petitioner, being a man with self-respect, may have restrained himself from approaching the courts earlier on the hope that his children would respect his needs. His patience for his children cannot be cited to deny his claim for maintenance, the Court added.“Even without any positive aid of law the court could have recognized the right of the elder irrespective of the religion to claim the past maintenance and future maintenance. Merely for the reason that the legislation had only provided measures for the award of prospective maintenance, that cannot result in denial of the claim for past maintenance,” the Court concluded..Hence, the High Court set aside the family court’s earlier decision to reject the senior citizen’s plea and asked the family court to consider the matter on merits.The parties to the dispute were asked to appear before the family court on September 12 and the family court was directed to decide on the case within two months thereafter.The senior citizen was represented by advocates Alex M Scaria, Beas K Pinnappan, AJ Riyas, Saritha Thomas, Alen J Cheruvil, Sahl Abhul Kader, and Sanjith Kumar R.The respondents (children) were represented by advocate P Venugopal..[Read Judgment]