Ahmedabad: A local court here ordered an NRI to pay Rs 40,000 monthly maintenance, Rs 20,000 house rent, and compensation of Rs 25 lakh to his ex-wife under the provisions of the Domestic Violence Act. While ordering maintenance for the woman, the court rejected the husband’s contention that his wife was living in adultery and that the family court granted him a divorce on the grounds of adultery and cruelty.Therefore, the woman was not entitled to maintenance, he argued. However, the court rejected this contention, citing that he did not take this defence at a proper stage.“If evidence from both sides is evaluated, during the applicant’s cross-examination, the opponent No 1 (husband) in his affidavit in examination-in-chief took a defence of extra-marital affairs of the applicant. However, it is important to note that the husband did not file any reply when this application was filed. This defence came up for the first time at the stage of evidence. By then, the family court already granted divorce to the husband on the grounds of adultery and cruelty on Jan 1, 2023.Therefore, the husband’s defence regarding the applicant’s character cannot be accepted,” reads the order passed by additional chief judicial magistrate at the Ahmedabad rural court last week.In this case, the woman is from Gandhinagar, and the husband is from the Sabarmati area of Ahmedabad. Their marriage took place in 2006, and they shifted to Abu Dhabi, where the woman allegedly faced domestic violence. The couple had a son in 2012. After their matrimonial discord, the woman returned to her paternal house with the child in 2016 and has been living there since then.While the husband filed for divorce, the woman sought maintenance in Ahmedabad’s family court. The woman also filed an FIR with Sabarmati police station and filed a complaint under the provisions of the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act in 2017.On Jan 20, 2023, the court granted divorce on the grounds of adultery and cruelty, but before that, the family court ordered the man to pay Rs 40,000 maintenance to the woman and child. After the hearing, the magisterial court found that the woman was a victim of domestic violence and she was entitled to the lifestyle her former husband is living in the UAE. The man claimed to be unemployed to evade maintenance, but the court said that it is not believable that the man is living abroad with his second wife and yet he is unemployed.