Introduction

Every year, thousands of elderly parents in India find themselves without financial support after the death of their only child. The desperation such circumstances produce is understandable — and in the case of Rakesh Kumar and his wife, it drove them to approach a Family Court in Agra, seeking maintenance from their daughter-in-law, a serving constable in the Uttar Pradesh Police. When the Family Court rejected their application, they carried their grievance to the Allahabad High Court.

The High Court’s decision in Rakesh Kumar and Another v. State of U.P. and Another (CRLR No. 6502 of 2025), delivered on February 4, 2026, is brief — barely three pages — but it squarely confronts one of the most emotionally charged and legally under-examined questions in Indian family law: can parents-in-law claim maintenance from a daughter-in-law under the statutory maintenance framework?

The answer, as the Court held, is an unequivocal no.

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Background and Facts

Rakesh Kumar and his wife were the parents of one Pravesh Kumar, who married opposite party no. 2 (the daughter-in-law) on April 26, 2016. Pravesh Kumar died on March 31, 2021, leaving behind his aged parents and his widow, who continued to serve as a Constable in the UP Police.

The revisionist parents contended that:

1. They are old, illiterate, and financially destitute.
2. Their deceased son was their sole means of support during his lifetime.
3. The daughter-in-law is gainfully employed, drawing a regular salary.
4. She has additionally received all service and retiral benefits arising from the deceased’s employment.
5. By virtue of these facts, she carries a moral — and, they urged, a legal — obligation to maintain them.

The Principal Judge, Family Court, Agra rejected their application on August 21, 2025. The parents then filed the present criminal revision before the Allahabad High Court under Section 144 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS).

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The Legal Question

The core issue before the Court was deceptively simple: do parents-in-law fall within the class of persons entitled to claim maintenance from a daughter-in-law under Section 144 BNSS / Section 125 Cr.P.C.?

Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure — now re-enacted as Section 144 of the BNSS — is a social welfare provision that provides a summary remedy for maintenance. It covers:

Conspicuously absent from this list is any reference to parents-in-law or a daughter-in-law’s obligation towards them.

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The Court’s Reasoning

Justice Madan Pal Singh’s reasoning is tightly structured and rests on the foundational principle that maintenance under Section 125 Cr.P.C. / Section 144 BNSS is a statutory right, not a general equitable one.

1. Strict Construction of the Statutory Categories

The Court reaffirmed the settled legal position that the right to claim maintenance under this provision is confined exclusively to the categories of persons expressly enumerated by the legislature. The statute does not include parents-in-law within its ambit. To read them in would amount to judicial legislation — something courts, particularly in the exercise of summary criminal jurisdiction, must avoid.

This is textbook statutory interpretation: where the legislature has specifically enumerated a list, the principle of expressio unius est exclusio alterius (the expression of one thing is the exclusion of others) applies. The omission of parents-in-law is not an oversight; it is a deliberate legislative choice.

2. Compassionate Employment — An Irrelevant Consideration

The revisionist parents had also sought to argue that the daughter-in-law’s employment was likely obtained on compassionate grounds — a contention that, if established, might ground a different legal argument about succession to benefits or quasi-contractual obligations.

The Court correctly brushed this aside on two grounds: first, there was no material on record to establish compassionate appointment; and second, even if such appointment were established, questions arising from it would not fall for adjudication in summary maintenance proceedings under Section 125 Cr.P.C. / Section 144 BNSS, which are limited in scope.

3. Succession and Property — Outside the Scope of Summary Proceedings

The argument about the daughter-in-law having received retiral and service benefits of the deceased was similarly repelled. The Court rightly noted that questions of succession, inheritance, and property rights are matters for civil courts to adjudicate under the appropriate civil law. They cannot be collaterally decided in summary criminal maintenance proceedings.

This distinction is crucial and well-established in Indian jurisprudence: Section 125 Cr.P.C. / Section 144 BNSS proceedings are summary in nature and cannot be converted into a platform for litigating complex civil disputes.

4. Moral Obligation ≠ Legal Obligation

The most rhetorically powerful — and the most legally vulnerable — argument advanced by the revisionists was that the daughter-in-law’s moral obligation to maintain her aged parents-in-law should be treated as a legal obligation by the Court.

Justice Singh rejected this with clarity and firmness:

“The concept of moral obligation, howsoever compelling it may appear, cannot be enforced as a legal obligation in the absence of a statutory mandate.” — Justice Madan Pal Singh, Allahabad HC, CRLR No. 6502 of 2025

This is correct law. Courts of law adjudicate legal rights and obligations. A moral obligation, however strong in its social or ethical content, does not acquire the status of a legal duty unless the legislature has expressly enacted it as such. The judiciary’s role is to interpret and apply the law as written, not to create new liability — however sympathetic the facts may be.

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Critical Analysis

The Legislative Gap: A Critical Concern

While the judgment is legally correct, it also exposes a significant legislative gap that the Indian Parliament has so far failed to address.

Consider the facts: a widowed daughter-in-law, employed and financially secure, who has arguably benefited from the deceased’s service benefits, refuses to support two aged, illiterate, and destitute in-laws who have no one else. Morally, this is deeply troubling. Legally, under the current framework, she faces no obligation.

The Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007, is the dedicated legislation for parental maintenance. Under this Act, “children” are obligated to maintain their parents. However, the Act defines “children” to include son, daughter, grandson, and granddaughter — and in certain limited circumstances, a “relative” who would inherit the property of the senior citizen.

The question therefore is: does a daughter-in-law who inherits from or benefits financially through the deceased qualify as a “relative” under the 2007 Act? This argument was not raised in the present proceedings (which were filed under the BNSS), and the Court did not address it. Had the revisionists approached the Maintenance Tribunal under the 2007 Act, the outcome may well have been different — or at least the legal landscape would have been more fully explored.

The BNSS Transition — A Missed Opportunity?

The proceedings were initiated under Section 144 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 — the new code that replaced the Cr.P.C. The Court treats Section 144 BNSS as corresponding to Section 125 Cr.P.C., which is accurate. However, the legislative re-codification was an opportunity to revisit and expand the categories of persons eligible for maintenance.

In many jurisdictions, elder care obligations are extended to include not just biological children but also those who have substantially benefited from a deceased family member’s estate. The BNSS, regrettably, did not seize this opportunity. The categories under Section 144 remain substantively identical to those under the old Section 125.

A Comment on Judicial Brevity

The judgment is three pages long. While brevity in judicial writing is often a virtue, this case raised questions that deserved more elaborate treatment — including a discussion of the 2007 Act, a consideration of whether the compassionate appointment argument warranted further inquiry, and perhaps some obiter observations directing the petitioners to a more appropriate remedy.

As it stands, the aged parents are left without guidance on where else they might seek relief. For a Court exercising revisional jurisdiction, a brief reference to alternative remedies would have served the cause of justice more fully.

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Conclusion

Rakesh Kumar and Another v. State of U.P. and Another is a legally correct but humanly unsatisfying judgment. The law, as written, offers no remedy to parents-in-law seeking maintenance from a daughter-in-law under the BNSS / Cr.P.C. framework.

But the law as written is not the end of the conversation. The judgment holds up a mirror to a legislative gap that India’s Parliament must urgently address. In a country where joint families are dissolving, sons are dying young, and aged parents are increasingly left without support, a statutory framework that ignores the obligations owed by those who have benefited from a deceased’s estate is incomplete — and arguably unjust.

Until Parliament acts, courts can only do what Justice Madan Pal Singh did: apply the law faithfully, even when the result is hard.