Maintenance. Son’s personal obligation to maintain his aged parents is not dependent on his possession of property but arises out of the mere relationship. Karnataka High Court.

K.Jayaprakash vs N. Kuppaswamy and another. Revision Petition Family Court No. 140/2016 decided on 17 November 2020.

Judgment Link: http://judgmenthck.kar.nic.in/judgmentsdsp/bitstream/123456789/354034/1/RPFC140-16-17-11-2020.pdf

Relevant paragraphs: The real question to be answered is whether a son can contend that he is under no obligation to maintain his aged parents? This Court may venture to say that this is an interesting case to address the question as to what filial obligations are?

A continuing need for care for elderly, combined with loosely knit family structures prompt the question  what filial obligations are. Do adult children of elderly  have a duty to care?

The phrase “filial obligations” is generally understood to       refer   to        special        duties—specific       kinds               of        actions, services, and attitudes—that children must provide to their parents simply because they are those parents’ offsprings. Filial       responsibility refers            to        the      sense        of obligation experienced by adult children to meet their older parents’ physical and emotional needs.

Contemporary societies, both west and east, retain a significant interest in how filial responsibility is maintained and experienced as an attitudinal basis for action to care  for and support older adults. In increasingly  aging societies, where we have seen increased life span in majority of adults what with new lifestyle management including yoga are in practice  and  consequential addition of years to their other wise shorter life span, the burden of filial responsibility on the children has increased considerably. Nevertheless, relative disability and filial responsibility and how they are associated with filial care giving and filial support to aging parents, are of major public interest and importance.

A son is under a personal obligation to maintain his aged parents. It is a legal obligation not dependent on his possession of property but arising out of the mere relationship between the parties.

In conclusion, this Court is of the view that the  object of the maintenance proceedings is not to punish a person for his past neglect, but to prevent vagrancy by compelling those who can do so to support those who are unable to support themselves and who have a moral claim to support.

Compiled by S. Basavaraj, Advocate, Daksha Legal.