Punchhi, J. - (1.) Special Leave granted.
(2.) The Secretary of the Tamil Nadu Wakf Board, Madras, and the Superintendent of Wakfs, Tirunelveli, the appellants herein, are aggrieved against an order of the High Court of Madras, dated 16-3-1994 in Crl. O.P. No. 3557/93 declining to interfere and quash a proceeding in M.C. No. 11/92 pending on the file of the Court of the Judicial Magistrate, Tiruchendur, in which the respondent - Syed Fatima Nachi - is claiming maintenance as the applicant.
(3.) The respondent is a Muslim divorced wife. She filed a petition against the appellants under Section 4(2) of the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights of Divorce) Act, 1986 (for short 'the Act') seeking maintenance at the rate of Rs.750/- per mensem. The petition was found on the facts that she was married to one Syed Ahmed Moulana on 10-6-1980 in accordance with the tenets of Muslim Law and out of the wedlock, she had procreated female twins on 6-4-1981. Her husband divorced her on 12-6-1986 and since then she has not remarried. Claiming that the respondent had no income or means to maintain herself, as well as her minor female children, none of them owning any property, she was, thus, unable to maintain herself and required intervention of the Court in providing her a suitable sum for maintenance. She claimed that she had earlier been leading a good life as a married woman but after divorce, was in dire straits and in suffering. She claimed that under the Mohammedan Law, a Muslim woman, in such circumstances, can get maintenance from her prospective heirs. According to her, a host of relatives as given in the Act as well as under the Mohammendan Law are responsible to provide maintenance to her and if those are unable to do so, the claim of maintenance must be met by the Wakf Board. It was also maintained that neither her prospective heirs nor her parents were in a position to provide maintenance to her and thus there lay a bounded duty on the Wakf Board to that effect; hence claim of Rs.750/- per mensem.;