The Allahabad High Court has held that mere social media messages cannot, by themselves, establish that a wife is “living in adultery” so as to deny her maintenance, in the absence of corroborative evidence showing physical intimacy or cohabitation.

The bench headed by Justice Jai Krishna Upadhyay made the observation while dismissing a husband’s challenge to a Family Court order directing him to pay maintenance to his wife.

The husband had argued that his wife was not entitled to maintenance as she was allegedly living in adultery. To support his claim, he relied on printouts of Instagram chats purportedly exchanged between his wife and an advocate with whom he alleged she was in an adulterous relationship.

The High Court, however, found that the alleged chats were insufficient to establish the accusation.

“Even if, for the sake of argument, the contents of the unverified chats were to be perused, mere text messages on a social media platform without corroborative evidence of physical intimacy or cohabitation are thoroughly insufficient to legally establish that the wife is continuously living in adultery,” the Court observed.

The Court explained that “living in adultery”, which can disentitle a wife from claiming maintenance under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), now corresponding to Section 144 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), refers to a continuous, ongoing and habitual course of adulterous conduct.

“It does not encompass a single, fleeting lapse, nor can it be inferred from mere conversational interactions, professional associations or unsubstantiated suspicions,” the Court said.

The High Court further held that a husband seeking to defeat a wife’s maintenance claim on this ground must produce clear and cogent evidence establishing a continuous adulterous lifestyle.

The Court also dealt with the evidentiary value of the Instagram chats, observing that electronic evidence is required to undergo statutory verification under Section 65-B of the Indian Evidence Act, given the inherent vulnerabilities associated with digital data. In the present case, the husband had failed to produce the requisite certification.

Finding that the Instagram messages were insufficient to establish that the wife was continuously living in adultery, the High Court dismissed the husband’s challenge to the Family Court’s maintenance order in its judgment dated September 29.