Suit for recovery of maintenance allowance and dowry articles --- Respondent / wife alleged that she was given valuable dowry articles at the time of marriage with petitioner ; he proceeded abroad to earn his livelihood and since then neither he came back nor paid any maintenance allowance --

 Suit for recovery of maintenance allowance and dowry articles --- Respondent / wife alleged that she was given valuable dowry articles at the time of marriage with petitioner ; he proceeded abroad to earn his livelihood and since then neither he came back nor paid any maintenance allowance --- Father of the from petitioner his house --- Petitioner was earning turned out her Rs . 2,50,000 / - per month --- Trial Court partially decreed the suit in terms that respondent was held entitled to recover maintenance allowance at the rate of Rs . 6000 / - per month till the expiry of her iddat and to recover the dowry articles as per list in addition to price of bed of Rs . 30,000 / - from the petitioner --- In appeal , maintenance allowance was enhanced to Rs . 12,000 / - per month and she was held entitled to receive the dowry articles or alternate price thereof , excluding some articles --- Validity-- According to respondent , monthly salary of the petitioner was of 3525 UAE Dirham in addition to earnings by overtime --- In support of her claim , respondent produced salary slip of the petitioner which showed that he was Associate Electrical Engineer and was drawing monthly salary 3525 Dirham --- On the other Ifand , petitioner produced his salary slip dated 8th April , 2019 , which showed his salary as 1732. Dirham excluding allowances --- It appeared that allowances had deliberately been excluded by petitioner to conceal his actual salary , which , if calculated in Pakistani currency , became more than one hundred thousand rupees --- Keeping in view the financial status of the petitioner and that there was no categorical denial regarding period of desertion of respondent , the Appellate Court had rightly enhanced her maintenance allowance from Rs.6000 / - to Rs . 12,000 / - per month --- As regards decree for recovery of dowry articles , petitioner relied on a USB containing pictures to establish that dowry articles had been returned --- Despite having accepted in evidence USB produced by the petitioner , both the Courts had only made reference to the same and had not discussed as to whether it was played and confronted to the witnesses to reach at a definite conclusion regarding the dowry articles given to respondent by her parents --- Even otherwise , no purpose to produce a video or audio would be served if it was not played and confronted to the witnesses --- With reference to the provisions of Art . 164 of the Qanun - e - Shahadat , 1984 , screening of video cassette was admissible in evidence and also conclusive in some cases --- Court below had failed to properly record the evidence and appreciate the same while deciding the suit filed by respondent --- In conclusion Appellate Court had correctly appreciated the evidence with regard to financial status of the petitioner and rightly enhanced the rate of maintenance allowance of respondent by setting aside the findings of the Trial Court to that effect --- However , the Trial Court while recording evidence of the parties had accepted the USB produced by the petitioner , but neither had confronted the same to the witnesses nor discussed having viewed the same by playing it --- Appellate Court also did not appreciate the evidence with regard to production , acceptance and playing of USB to view the pictures --- In the circumstances , the findings of the Courts below with regard to recovery of dowry articles were not in accordance with law and were liable to be set aside --- Constitutional petition was partly allowed by setting aside the judgments and decrees of both the Courts below to the extent of recovery of dowry articles and the case was remanded to the trial Court for decision afresh , after confronting the witnesses with the USB produced by the petitioner and recording their evidence to that effect in addition to any other necessary evidence .

WP 23372 of 2020
Babar Rasool vs ADJ Ssrgodha
2024 YLR 265