Bengaluru Techie Suicide: Justice vs Misuse of Alimony Laws in India

Recently, due to harassment over alimony, a Bangalore techie named Atul Subhash committed suicide. This has led to backlash over the internet against his wife and sparked debates about alimony laws in India and the need for gender-neutral reforms.

What Atul went through is surely horrible. If the statements about the judges and his wife are to be believed, asking him why he isn't dead yet is just plain apathy. No innocent should go through all this. 

However, scrapping alimony altogether isn't a practical solution. This will inhibit justice and the ability to walk out of an unhappy/abusive marriage for a lot of people, mostly women. The system of alimony was incorporated into laws as a gender-neutral law that can help both men and women in marriage, whoever doesn't earn or does not earn sufficiently to sustain. 

In India, women are paid less than their counterparts. In most cases, women do not earn or earn quite less than their husbands. During marriage prospects, a lot of guys' sides of the family do not accept the idea of the wife earning more than the husband to not stab the male ego. After pregnancy and womanhood, many women lose their jobs or have to start all over again. Women's financial independence gets controlled as husbands and in-laws won't let her work or won't support her in chores and parenthood, forcing her to give up her job. All these things make women not have the financial means to be able to walk out of a marriage if things go south. This led alimony to be usually given to women rather than husbands, who earned more than their wives. Patriarchy itself led to a law that was gender-neutral (at least amongst Hindus) turning biased towards women. 

A few gold diggers like Atul Subhash's wife do happen to turn their ugly heads up. In Indian marriage system, a small amount ends up in divorce, out of which these cases of extreme alimony demands are even less, which even get entertained by courts. Even in existing marriages, gold digger women exist in a minority. As women, we don't claim them either. There is a difference between seeking security for survival and trying to live a luxurious life by harassing someone else.

Today, I came across a resurfaced video of a lady judge criticizing a woman's demand of Rs. 6 lakhs alimony a month. She struck down the demand, stating if she wanted this amount, let her earn. In the comments section, several commented that if she were in Atul Subhash's case, it would have saved him from committing suicide. 

Some women like this are responsible, but incorrect implementation of law and gender norms are even more responsible in the harassment & suicide cases over alimony. I read this line somewhere and it hits home- "justice is not for middle-class people." It is unfortunately so true, despite the amount of tax middle-class people pay to the government and a large part of the country's economy. The (incompetent and corrupt) law system is earning truckloads of money when neither gender is getting justice.

For the people blindly criticising alimony, asking it to be eradicated, the law usually allows 20-25% of a man's net worth to be given as alimony, depending on various factors that vary case by case. Hardly a few extreme cases like this show up.

Image Source- Lawyer Tanya Appachu Kaul on Instagram 

In my opinion, along with the above factors, cheating and abuse of any kind — physical, sexual, mental, emotional, verbal, and financial — should be a reason for demanding alimony from the guilty party. Though money won't heal the pain, it can soften the blow. Here, it can be a lesson for that person to not repeat it with any other future partner. 

Pre-nuptials are a solution that can help men from exorbitant alimony demands and harassment. This will lay down the division of property, income and assets, spousal support, debt responsibility and inheritance rights. Pre-nuptials in India will provide a sense of mental peace to both partners or whoever earns (more). The Indian government needs to make prenuptials legal across India, which isn't legally recognized yet. Making prenuptials legal will also put less pressure on family courts over these matters. Strict law implementation against false cases is another need of the hour. This will protect innocent men from any possible cases of false cases on dowry or domestic violence accusations. 

I am just concerned about escalated hatred women community will now get after this suicide for action of one woman. Bullies on internet have been shaming women, asking for our basic rights and freedom to be stripped away, much like state of women in Taliban-occupied Afghanistan. Here, minority of men have to go through false cases or alimony harrassments, but almost all women have to deal with physical abuse, groping, catcalling, (marital/date) rape, honour killing, financial abuse on daily basis. Indian judiciary system is already incompetent, and this hate will give rise to such cases even more.

What Atul Subhash had to go through was unfortunate, but similar cases of demanding exorbitant alimonies and harassing over it shouldn't happen with others and the above 2 legal measures can help reduce such cases to crop up.  Reforming alimony laws in India to be truly gender-neutral is essential for preventing tragedies like Atul Subhash’s case.