What Is Interim Maintenance and How Fast Can You Get It?

What interim maintenance actually covers

Interim maintenance is a court order for a monthly sum, payable while a matrimonial case is pending, so that the spouse without means can live and can fight the case. Lawyers also call it maintenance pendente lite, which simply means maintenance during the litigation. It ends, or is replaced, when the court passes its final order on maintenance or alimony.

Two separate heads are usually claimed together. The first is the monthly amount for food, rent, medical costs, the children's schooling and ordinary living. The second is litigation expenses: the cost of the case itself, including lawyer's fees, travel to court and photocopies. Under Section 24 of the Hindu Marriage Act 1955 the court can award both. Many people forget to ask for litigation expenses as a separate item and lose it.

Interim maintenance is not a finding that the other spouse is at fault. The court does not decide who broke the marriage at this stage. It looks at two things only: does the applicant have enough independent income to support herself or himself, and what can the other side afford to pay. That is why interim maintenance can be ordered even in a case the paying spouse may finally win.

It is also not final. An interim order can be changed if circumstances change, for example if the paying spouse loses a job or the applicant starts earning. Our guide on whether maintenance can be reduced if your income falls covers that situation.

Which law lets you claim interim maintenance

How fast can you get interim maintenance in Delhi?

The honest answer is: faster than the main case, slower than the law intends. Both Section 24 HMA and Section 144 BNSS say the interim application should be decided, as far as possible, within sixty days from service of notice. The words as far as possible matter. Courts treat the sixty days as a direction, not a deadline that ends anything if missed.

In the Delhi family courts at Tis Hazari, Saket, Karkardooma, Rohini, Dwarka and the other district complexes, a straightforward interim maintenance application where both sides file their affidavits on time is often decided within two to five months of filing. Where service is delayed, the other side seeks time repeatedly, or the case goes to mediation first, it can take six to nine months, sometimes longer. Matters before a magistrate under the Domestic Violence Act follow a similar range.

The good news is that delay does not cost you the money. In Rajnesh v. Neha (2020) the Supreme Court held that maintenance in all proceedings should be awarded from the date of the application. So if you applied in January and the order comes in June, the paying spouse owes arrears for January to May along with the June amount. Courts usually give a time-bound schedule for clearing the arrears.

Some family court judges fix a modest ad interim amount at an early hearing where the need is obvious, such as a wife with a small child and no income at all. This is not a right and you should not count on it, but asking for it with proof of urgent need, such as a school fee notice or a hospital bill, is reasonable.

Time and cost at each stage

How to apply for interim maintenance, step by step

This is the usual sequence in a Delhi family court. The steps under the Domestic Violence Act before a magistrate are similar.

1. Pick the right case to attach it to

   If a divorce or other HMA petition is already pending, the Section 24 application is filed in that case. If nothing is pending, you can file a maintenance petition under Section 144 BNSS, or a Domestic Violence Act case, and seek interim maintenance within it. Do not file three cases for the same money without thinking about adjustment, which we cover below.

2. Prepare your affidavit of assets and liabilities

   Use the disclosure format annexed to Rajnesh v. Neha. Fill in every column: income, assets, liabilities, expenses, the children's needs and any earlier maintenance cases. Attach proof for each figure you can prove.

3. File and ask for a short date

   File the application with the affidavit. If the need is urgent, say so in the application and attach proof, and ask the court for an early date for reply. Note the date of filing, because arrears will run from it.

4. Serve the other side and track service

   Make sure notice actually reaches the other spouse. Give every address you know, including the workplace and email. Delayed service is the commonest reason interim maintenance takes months.

5. Check the reply and the other affidavit carefully

   When the other spouse files a reply and affidavit, compare the stated income with bank statements, salary slips, tax returns and lifestyle. Point out gaps in a short rejoinder rather than in a long attack on the person.

6. Argue on figures, not on fault

   At the hearing, the judge wants numbers: what each side earns, what the children need, what is reasonable. Allegations about the marriage rarely help at this stage.

7. Get the order and follow the payment schedule

   Obtain a copy of the order. Note the monthly amount, the date by which it must be paid each month and the arrears schedule. Keep a record of every payment received.

If the order is not complied with, start enforcement promptly. Arrears that are allowed to pile up for a year or more become harder to recover, and under Section 144 BNSS the recovery application should be made within one year from the date the amount fell due.

The affidavit of assets after Rajnesh v. Neha

Since November 2020 every maintenance case in India, including interim maintenance, runs on a sworn affidavit of disclosure of assets and liabilities filed by both sides. The Supreme Court in Rajnesh v. Neha laid down the format, with separate versions for different kinds of cases, and directed that the applicant file it with the application and the respondent file it with the reply. Before that, the Delhi High Court had already required a similar income affidavit in Kusum Sharma v. Mahinder Kumar Sharma, so Delhi family courts were used to the idea.

The affidavit asks for personal details, education and work, monthly income from all sources, movable and immovable property, bank accounts, investments, loans, regular expenses, the children's schooling and medical costs, and details of any other maintenance proceedings. It must be supported by documents such as income tax returns, salary slips and bank statements. A false statement in it can lead to proceedings for perjury, and the court can draw an adverse inference against a party who does not file it or files it with blanks.

In practice, the affidavit of assets is where most interim maintenance applications are won or lost. When Advocate B.K. Singh prepares a client's affidavit, he asks for three years of bank statements before anything else, because the statements show the real pattern of spending and income that a salary slip alone hides. A wife who can show the household's actual monthly spending during the marriage, from her own or joint account entries, puts the court in a far better position than one who writes a round figure.

The same applies to the paying spouse. An affidavit that lists a modest salary but leaves out rental income, a car loan being repaid comfortably, or regular foreign trips invites the court to assume a higher income. Courts in Delhi have repeatedly fixed interim maintenance on an assessed income, higher than the declared figure, where the affidavit did not match the lifestyle.

Documents to collect before you file

How the court works out the amount

There is no fixed formula, but Rajnesh v. Neha lists what the court should weigh: the status of the parties, the reasonable needs of the wife and children, whether the applicant is educated and qualified, any independent income she or he has, the standard of living during the marriage, any job given up for the family, reasonable litigation costs, and the paying spouse's financial capacity, including his or her own reasonable expenses and liabilities.

Many judges use a rough benchmark from Kalyan Dey Chowdhury v. Rita Dey Chowdhury (2017), where the Supreme Court said that 25 per cent of the husband's net salary would be a just and proper amount as maintenance to the wife in that case. It is a guide, not a rule. Where there are children, the share is often higher. Where the paying spouse supports elderly parents or has heavy legitimate loans, it may be lower.

An earning wife is not automatically shut out. The question is whether her income is sufficient to keep her at a standard close to the one she had in the marriage. The Supreme Court has also pointed out that being capable of earning and actually earning are different things. A wife with a degree who has not worked for ten years cannot be told she should just find a job tomorrow. On the other hand, a wife earning roughly what the husband earns will usually get little or nothing for herself, though the children's needs may still be shared.

Children's expenses are often the larger part of the order. School fees, transport, tuition, uniforms and medical costs, with receipts, are hard to argue against. Courts in Delhi frequently direct the paying parent to pay school fees directly to the school in addition to a monthly amount, which reduces disputes about how the money is spent.

When the earning spouse hides income

Hidden income is the most common complaint in interim maintenance cases. A business owner shows a small taxable profit; a salaried professional resigns just before the hearing; a husband transfers money to his parents' accounts. Family courts in Delhi are familiar with all of these.

The court has tools. It can direct production of bank statements and tax records, summon the employer for salary details, and draw an adverse inference from a vague or evasive affidavit. In appropriate cases it assesses income from lifestyle evidence: the car he drives, the flat he lives in, the holidays posted on social media, the credit card bills. A sudden resignation shortly before the hearing is usually viewed with suspicion, and courts have fixed maintenance on earning capacity where the resignation looked tactical.

If you are the applicant, collect what you can lawfully access before filing: photographs of salary slips that were left at home, the name and designation from his LinkedIn profile, property details from registered documents, the company's filings if he runs a private company. Do not hack accounts or take documents in a way that could itself become a criminal complaint. Point the court to sources it can call for; that is usually enough.

Overlapping claims: HMA, BNSS and the Domestic Violence Act

Many wives file under more than one law: a divorce case with a Section 24 application, a maintenance case under Section 144 BNSS, and a Domestic Violence Act case seeking monetary relief. The law allows this, because the remedies are separate. But Rajnesh v. Neha made two things clear: the applicant must disclose earlier proceedings and orders in the later case, and the later court must take the earlier amount into account by adjusting or setting it off.

So filing everywhere does not multiply the money. What it does is multiply the hearings. In most cases it makes sense to pursue interim maintenance seriously in one forum, usually the one that is moving fastest or that will finally decide the main dispute, and keep the other claims limited.

For the paying spouse, the practical point is to place every existing order before each court. A husband already paying under a family court order should say so, with proof of payment, the moment a Domestic Violence Act court takes up a similar claim. Our page on appeals and revisions against Domestic Violence Act orders covers that forum.

If the order is not paid

An interim maintenance order that is ignored can be enforced, and the method depends on the law it was passed under. A Section 24 HMA order is executable like a decree of a civil court under Section 28A of the Act: the court can attach salary or bank accounts, attach property and in some cases order civil detention. Rajnesh v. Neha also noted that, as a last resort, courts may strike off the defence of a spouse who wilfully refuses to pay interim maintenance, which means the main case may proceed as if he had no answer.

An order under Section 144 BNSS is enforced under Section 144(3): for each month's default, the magistrate or family court can issue a warrant for levying the amount and can sentence the defaulter to imprisonment for up to one month, or until payment if sooner. The application must be made within one year from the date the amount became due, so do not let arrears sit for years.

For salaried respondents, the simplest route is often a direction to the employer to deduct the amount from salary and pay it directly. Where the paying spouse is abroad, enforcement is harder; the court may consider measures that bite in India, such as attachment of property or bank accounts here, and in some cases the High Court has used its powers in pending proceedings to secure compliance.

Challenging an interim maintenance order in the Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court does not decide interim maintenance in the first instance; the family court or magistrate does. The High Court comes in when one side wants the order changed. Which route applies depends on the law the order was made under and which court made it.

An order of a Delhi family court on a Section 24 HMA application is generally challenged by appeal under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act 1984, heard by a Division Bench of the High Court. The Delhi High Court has held that the 30-day limit in Section 19 applies, not the 90 days in Section 28 HMA, though delay can be condoned for sufficient cause. An order under Section 144 BNSS passed by a family court goes to the High Court in revision under Section 19(4) of the Family Courts Act. Orders under the Domestic Violence Act go first to the Sessions Court under Section 29, and only then to the High Court. Our page on appeals against family court orders explains the appeal route, and our page on maintenance revision in the Delhi High Court covers revisions.

The High Court interferes with interim maintenance only where the order is clearly wrong: a figure with no basis in the evidence, an income assessed by ignoring documents on record, or a failure to consider the applicant's own income. It does not re-weigh every rupee. Filing an appeal also does not suspend the order automatically. Unless the High Court stays it, the amount must keep being paid, and courts are reluctant to hear a husband who has paid nothing.

Because the High Court sits only in New Delhi, the territorial question is simple for Delhi orders. If your family court is in Gurugram, Faridabad, Noida or Ghaziabad, the challenge goes to the Punjab and Haryana High Court or the Allahabad High Court, not to Delhi. Our page on Delhi family courts lists which complexes handle family matters.

Mistakes that delay or reduce interim maintenance

• An incomplete affidavit of assets. Blank columns and round figures lead to adjournments and weaken your credibility.
• Not asking for litigation expenses. It is a separate head under Section 24 HMA and is often forgotten.
• Wrong or incomplete address for service. Every month of failed service is a month of delay.
• Hiding your own income or earlier orders. Courts take a dim view of non-disclosure by the applicant too, and it can cost you the claim.
• Arguing the whole marriage at the interim stage. Long allegations of cruelty do not raise the amount; documents about income and expenses do.
• Letting arrears pile up. Start recovery after two or three months of non-payment, not after two years.

If you are the spouse asked to pay

A Section 24 application or a BNSS maintenance petition is not something to ignore or answer with a one-line denial. File your reply and affidavit of assets on time, with documents. If you are paying the EMI on the house where your wife and children live, or paying school fees directly, say so with proof; courts count these payments.

If the claim is inflated, show it with figures, not adjectives. If your wife is earning, produce what you can: her appointment letter, LinkedIn profile, professional registration, tax filings you have legitimate access to. If your income has genuinely fallen, explain why with documents, because a bare claim of loss will be read as concealment.

Advocate B.K. Singh's practical advice to a paying spouse is to start paying a reasonable amount voluntarily, by bank transfer, as soon as the separation happens, and to keep records. A husband who has been sending a steady monthly sum and paying school fees walks into the interim hearing in a far better position than one who stopped everything and waited for an order. It also goes a long way if the case later goes to mediation.

NRIs and spouses living abroad

Interim maintenance claims against a spouse working abroad are common in Delhi. The family court can proceed once notice is served, and service abroad can be done through email and other permitted modes where the court allows, besides the formal routes. The affidavit of assets must include foreign income and assets, converted into rupees with the exchange rate stated.

The difficulty is enforcement, not the order. A spouse abroad with no assets in India can delay payment for a long time. Practical levers include attachment of property, bank accounts and investments in India, and the fact that the spouse will usually need to return to India at some point. A non-paying spouse who wants relief from the court, such as a divorce decree or travel permissions, will find the court asking about compliance first.

If you are the NRI, you can take part through a lawyer and appear by video conference where the court permits. Our guide on how NRIs can handle divorce cases in Delhi without travelling explains the practical arrangements, including powers of attorney.

What to do this week

If you are claiming, start the affidavit of assets now: pull three years of bank statements, gather the children's fee receipts and medical bills, and write down every source of the other spouse's income you know about. Decide which case your application will go in, and file as early as possible, because arrears only run from the date of the application.

If you have been served, diary the next date, collect your tax returns, salary slips and bank statements, and list every payment you have made since the separation. If an interim order has already been passed and you think it is wrong, remember the 30-day limit for an appeal; read our page on challenging maintenance orders in the Delhi High Court before the time runs out.

For advice on your maintenance papers, or for updates on how Delhi courts are deciding interim maintenance, you can contact Advocate B.K. Singh.