Supreme Court Doubles Alimony to ₹50,000, Rules Divorced Wife Entitled to Marriage-Era Living Standards
Last Updated on June 4, 2025 by Amit Patra
In a landmark judgement which redefines matrimonial responsibilities in divorce, the Supreme Court has almost doubled a divorced woman’s permanent alimony from ₹20,000 to ₹50,000 per month, holding that an unmarried divorced woman must be granted support in proportion to her matrimonial standard and future safeguard.
The two-judge bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta gave this historic judgment in Rakhi Sadhukhan v. Raja Sadhukhan, placing on record that “the appellant-wife, who is not married and is staying separately, is entitled to a proportionate level of maintenance which corresponds to the standard of living she lived during marriage and which reasonably secures her future.”
The case involved a couple who had married in 1997 and had a son in 1998 and had separated in 2008. The Calcutta High Court had ordered divorce on grounds of mental cruelty and irretrievable breakdown of marriage, directing permanent alimony of ₹20,000 per month with an increase of 5% every three years. The wife had, however, objected to the quantum as being inadequate in light of the economic means of her husband.
Before the court, the wife produced her husband, who worked in the Institute of Hotel Management in Kolkata, and had a net salary of ₹1.64 lakh every month. The wife claimed that alimony approved was inadequate to uphold her former way of life and didn’t consider present inflation rates.
The husband responded by quoting heavy financial levies such as maintenance of his second wife, emotional support family members, and aged parents. He added their 26-year-old son was now financially stable and suggested lower maintenance loads.
The Supreme Court dismissed such arguments and noted that “the respondent-husband’s income, financial disclosures, and past earnings reveal he is capable of paying more.” The Court increased the alimony to ₹50,000 per month with a 5% increase every two years, considering the inflationary pressures and the wife’s total reliance on maintenance for economic survival.
As regards the adult son, the Court clarified that there was no mandatory maintenance but that the father was free to pay for education or reasonable expenditure at his discretion. The judgment also preserved the son’s rights of inheritance under applicable laws.
This decision has sound precedent in the sense that it maintains that divorce should not lead to a precipitous drop in the standard of living of a woman, especially where the husband has sufficient financial resources and the wife is single and relies on alimony to maintain herself.
