By Adv. Aman Chawla | Matrimonial Law Specialist | Delhi High Court & Supreme Court of India
A daughter turns eighteen in March. By April her father has stopped the monthly transfer, and her engineering fees fall due in July. The divorce case between her parents is still crawling through the Saket Family Court. Nobody can tell her who pays, and that gap is where maintenance for adult children gets difficult.
Plenty of Delhi families know some version of this story. Does the law protect a child who has crossed eighteen but still studies full time, earns nothing and depends on a parent who walked away? It depends on the route you take, because two different statutes cover the ground. And a legal analysis published on 11 October 2026 has set the debate moving again.
The honest answer is “sometimes”. An unmarried Hindu daughter has a strong claim. A grown son has a much narrower one. Below, we go through both routes, the arguments courts actually hear, and what makes a claim hold together.
Why Maintenance for Adult Children Is Back in the News
On 11 October 2026, SCC Times ran an analysis by two Madhya Pradesh advocates, Shruti Awasthi and Arpit Singh. Their question is a sharp one. Does Section 144(1)(c) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) already cover adult children who can’t pay for their education? You can read the full piece on the SCC Times website.
That section lets a magistrate order maintenance for a grown child only if a physical or mental abnormality or injury leaves the child unable to earn. Awasthi and Singh argue that “injury” also covers harm to the mind. In their view, a young adult who loses the chance to study has suffered exactly that kind of harm.
One caution before going further. This is a scholarly argument, not a court ruling, and the authors themselves say the Supreme Court hasn’t endorsed it. It still matters. Lawyers now have a fresh way to frame an old problem.
The debate also arrives alongside firmer language from the courts. In January 2025, a Supreme Court bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan treated a daughter’s claim to educational expenses as a right the law can enforce. Her parents had lived apart for 26 years and settled their divorce through mediation. The husband agreed to pay ₹73 lakh, with ₹43 lakh set aside for the daughter, who was studying in Ireland. The bench asked her to keep the money, as the Deccan Herald reported.
Two Legal Routes, Two Different Rulebooks
Think of the law as two separate doors, each leading to a different set of rules.
The first door is personal law. For Hindus, Section 20 of the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956 (HAMA) sets out the duty to maintain children. The second is the criminal procedure code. Section 125 of the old CrPC became Section 144 BNSS on 1 July 2024, and it applies whatever your religion.
The two doors differ in speed and reach. Section 144 BNSS is a summary remedy, built to stop destitution quickly. Section 20 HAMA gives wider relief, but a court decides it after a fuller hearing. The Supreme Court drew that line in Abhilasha v. Prakash (2020).
The choice matters, then. One route moves faster and covers less, while the other covers more and takes longer. Families often file under both and let the court adjust the final figure. In Rajnesh v. Neha (2021), the Supreme Court allowed overlapping claims but barred double recovery. Our page on maintenance law in Delhi explains how this works in practice.
The HAMA Route for Hindu Families
Section 20(3) says a Hindu must maintain an unmarried daughter who can’t support herself from her own earnings or other property. What the clause leaves out is just as telling. It sets no age limit, and it doesn’t require a disability. Marriage ends the duty, and so does her ability to support herself.
Section 3(b) defines maintenance broadly. It takes in food, clothing, housing, education and medical care, and for an unmarried daughter it also covers the reasonable cost of her marriage.
In Abhilasha v. Prakash, the Supreme Court called the unmarried daughter’s right absolute and enforceable against her father, building on Jagdish Jugtawat v. Manju Lata (2002). But there was a catch. A magistrate hearing a Section 125 application can’t award this wider relief. The daughter in Abhilasha lost her plea in the criminal court, and the Court left her free to file under HAMA instead.
The judgment also points to a practical path. A Family Court can hear both kinds of claim, so it may spare a family two rounds of litigation. Ask your lawyer which framing suits the court where your case sits.
Section 144 BNSS and the Disability Gate
Section 144(1)(c) is narrower. It reaches a child who has attained majority, other than a married daughter, but only when a physical or mental abnormality or injury leaves that child unable to maintain themselves. A 25-year-old with a severe disability fits comfortably. A healthy nineteen-year-old studying law doesn’t fit the plain words.
The history explains the tension. Under the old 1898 Code, the Supreme Court in Nanak Chand v. Chandra Kishore Aggarwal (1969) granted maintenance to two adult sons studying for an M.Com and an MBBS. The real test, it said, was inability to maintain oneself, not age. Parliament later wrote “minor” into the 1973 Code and added a separate disability clause.
Courts have disagreed ever since. The Gujarat High Court refused a major son who was pursuing education in Nitaben Dineshkumar Oza (2016), and the Supreme Court rejected children’s claims on the ground of majority in Amarendra Kumar Paul v. Maya Paul (2009). Other courts read the section generously and granted relief.
Given that split, careful lawyers rarely bet on a single door.
The “Mental Injury” Argument in Plain Words
The BNSS doesn’t define “injury”. It borrows from the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which describes injury as harm illegally caused to a person’s body, mind, reputation or property. The Orissa High Court leaned on that wide definition in Jitendra Nath Sarkar v. Dalia Sarkar (1999), while discussing an unmarried major daughter. It did call its view preliminary.
Awasthi and Singh take the next step. Suppose a father refuses to pay and the child can no longer study. That child, they say, suffers harm to the mind, and the harm fits clause (c). They add that maintenance has always included education, because HAMA’s definition says so.
Will courts accept it? Perhaps. The logic appeals because it lets one Family Court handle the child’s claim in one place. But judges may resist, and the Gujarat High Court has warned that even beneficial laws can’t override plain statutory words. So treat “mental injury” as a supporting argument rather than the foundation of your case.
What About Adult Sons?
A son’s position is weaker, and families deserve honesty about that. HAMA Section 20(1) obliges a parent to maintain a child during minority. After eighteen, a healthy son has no HAMA claim, and Section 144 BNSS needs a disability. That leaves the Nanak Chand line of reasoning, the mental injury argument and private agreement.
In practice, agreement matters most. Many fathers keep paying a son’s fees voluntarily, and the smart move is to put that promise in writing. We come back to this in the settlement section below.
One related ruling deserves a mention. SCC Online reported that the Madhya Pradesh High Court held a father cannot treat his son’s and daughter’s education differently. He was paying ₹5.45 lakh a year for his adult son’s BTech. The court wouldn’t let that spending shrink the minor daughter’s maintenance, and it gave her needs priority.
What Counts as Education Expenses?
Courts ask what a reasonable education costs and what the paying parent can afford. Tuition comes first. Hostel rent, books, exam fees, a laptop, coaching and local travel often follow. The better a claimant documents each item, the less room a court has to trim it.
The Bombay High Court showed this approach in a 2011 ruling that PTI covered. It held that a father had to fund his unmarried daughter’s higher education until her marriage. The court deducted the ₹8 lakh he had already paid and told him to clear the rest of the loan she had taken.
Study abroad calls for caution. The January 2025 Supreme Court order involving Ireland came out of a consent settlement, so it doesn’t mean every parent must fund a foreign degree. The phrase “within their means” cuts both ways.
Fathers also lean on loans as a defence. In Deepa Joshi v. Gaurav Joshi (2026 INSC 370), the Supreme Court held that a husband’s repayments on asset loans couldn’t dilute his duty to his wife. That was a spousal maintenance case. Still, a court could reason the same way when a father sets a home-loan EMI against his child’s fees.
Marriage Expenses for Unmarried Daughters
Section 3(b) HAMA reaches a daughter’s wedding costs, and courts take that seriously. A Delhi High Court Division Bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Jasmeet Singh held that an earning, unmarried daughter can’t be assumed to have enough for her own wedding. It directed ₹35 lakh for the elder daughter and ₹50 lakh for the younger, who earned nothing and had a wedding already scheduled. The Chhattisgarh High Court, by contrast, awarded ₹2,500 a month until marriage and ₹5 lakh for wedding costs.
The gap between those numbers is huge. Courts scale awards to the father’s wealth and the family’s standard of living, so neither figure works as a benchmark for your own case.
How Fathers Defend These Claims
Fathers usually push back in four ways, and a few of those arguments carry real weight.
The most common is that the child already earns enough. Courts test that against real income, not imagined potential. A small stipend rarely defeats a claim, but a steady salary can.
Then there’s the argument that the child has cut contact. In a March 2022 order, the Supreme Court declined to make a father fund a twenty-year-old daughter’s education and marriage after she said she wanted no relationship with him. The Court had arranged a meeting at its mediation center and said she would need some interaction if she wanted his help. Since that order came out of a mediated divorce, treat it as a signal rather than a binding rule.
Some fathers say they simply lack the means. Retirement, an ageing parent or another dependent child can all count here. If retirement drives the argument, our guide on retirement corpus and maintenance explains why courts treat capital and income differently. A father who claims he has no job gets similar scrutiny, which we cover in our article on unemployed husbands and maintenance.
Finally, a father may point out that the child already gets money elsewhere. Courts do adjust for amounts the child receives under other orders, and Rajnesh v. Neha bars double recovery.
Building a Claim That Holds Up
Strong claims rest on paper. Collect the admission letter and the institution’s fee schedule. Add receipts and bank statements that show who paid what. Prove the child has no income, and disclose any scholarship or loan up front, because hiding it hands the father an easy line of cross-examination.
Then document the refusal. Messages asking for fees, and replies that dodge or decline, help a great deal. Our article on WhatsApp chats as evidence in family court explains how to preserve them properly.
Who files? The child can, but a mother often files for a major child who lives with her. The Bombay High Court backed that approach in Agnes Lily Irudaya v. Irudaya Kani Arsan, treating the objection that a mother can’t claim for a major daughter as technical and refusing to let it block relief.
Timing counts too. Under Rajnesh v. Neha, maintenance runs from the date of application, so every month of delay costs money you may never recover. If an order already exists and the father isn’t paying, our guide on maintenance arrears recovery explains your remedies.
Drafting the Education Clause in a Settlement
Most families settle, which makes the clause more important than any judgment. A vague promise to “bear education expenses” just invites a second fight.
Name the course, or write “one undergraduate and one postgraduate degree”. Fix a percentage or a cap, and say whether the father pays the institution directly. Add an annual review for fee hikes. State what ends the duty, whether that’s marriage, a job above an agreed income, repeated failure or a voluntary dropout. Cover scholarships and loans too, and decide who approves a foreign course.
Let the child sign as well. In the Ireland case, the Supreme Court noted that the daughter had signed the November 2024 settlement.
Take care with termination language, too. In a 2026 ruling that Prime Legal summarised, the Supreme Court read a settlement as a whole and refused to add maintenance beyond the agreed ₹1 crore. Courts won’t rescue a poorly drafted deal. Our pages on mutual consent divorce and legal documentation show how we approach these clauses.
What Other Guides Miss
We reviewed the pages that currently rank for adult daughters’ and children’s maintenance. Legal Service India and Advocate Tanwar explain Abhilasha v. Prakash well, and TCL India summarises the Section 20(3) holding clearly. Shonee Kapoor’s coverage of the Chhattisgarh High Court order adds a useful wedding-cost example.
The gaps show up in the details. Almost every page stops at unmarried daughters and ignores sons. Few mention Section 144 BNSS by its new number, and none of the pages we reviewed discusses the “mental injury” argument published on 11 October. Few explain how a mother can file, how to prove a child’s lack of income or how to draft the education clause in a settlement. Hardly any cover the March 2022 refusal order or the father’s loan defence.
We’ve tried to fill those gaps and to treat fathers and children fairly.
Filing in Delhi
Family Courts at Saket, Dwarka, Rohini, Karkardooma, Patiala House and Tis Hazari hear most of these applications. A challenge can reach the Delhi High Court, and a larger legal question can go to the Supreme Court of India. Which appeal route applies depends on the type of order, so ask your lawyer before you file.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can a father stop paying once his child turns eighteen?
Not automatically. An unmarried Hindu daughter can still claim under Section 20(3) HAMA after eighteen if she can’t support herself. A son’s position is narrower.
Does a married daughter qualify?
No. Section 144(1)(c) BNSS excludes married daughters, and Section 20(3) HAMA covers only unmarried ones.
Can my adult son claim maintenance while he studies?
Only through narrower arguments. HAMA covers a son during minority, and BNSS needs a disability. The mental injury theory hasn’t yet won Supreme Court approval, so a written agreement gives the safest footing.
Can a mother claim on behalf of a major child?
In many cases, yes. The Bombay High Court let a mother claim for her dependent, unmarried major daughter’s education.
Does religion matter?
Section 20 HAMA covers Hindus, while Section 144 BNSS applies whatever the religion. Families from other communities should take advice on how personal law affects their claim.
Does a part-time income end the claim?
Not necessarily. Courts compare real income with reasonable needs, and a modest stipend rarely covers fees, hostel and travel together.
Can I change the amount later?
Yes, in the right case. Fee hikes or a child’s new income can justify a change. Our guides on increasing maintenance and reducing or stopping maintenance explain how.
The Bottom Line on Maintenance for Adult Children
Adult children aren’t left without options, but they need the right door. An unmarried Hindu daughter can rely on Section 20 HAMA, and a disabled adult child can use Section 144 BNSS. A healthy adult son depends mostly on agreement, at least until a court accepts the mental injury argument.
Documents, timing and clear settlement wording decide most of these cases. Fathers do best when they disclose honestly and stay realistic about what they owe. Mothers and children should file early and prove the need line by line.
If this sounds familiar, speak to our matrimonial lawyers in Delhi or request a confidential consultation. We also write about child custody disputes that often run alongside these claims.
Written by Adv. Aman Chawla. This article offers general information and does not replace legal advice. Outcomes depend on the facts, the evidence, the statute and the court. Please consult a qualified lawyer before you act.
Talk to a maintenance lawyer in Delhi. Call +91 80768 36899, email info@thematrimoniallawyers.com or request a confidential consultation. Office: Basement, O-11A, Block O, Jungpura Extension, New Delhi 110014.
