P. Krishna Kumar, J.

1. The respondent herein, who is the wife of the appellant, filed a petition seeking recovery of gold ornaments and money. By the impugned judgment, the Family Court allowed the claim for realisation of money alone. Aggrieved thereby, the husband has preferred this appeal.

2. For the sake of convenience, the parties are hereinafter referred to as they were arrayed in the original petition. The marriage between the petitioner and the respondent was solemnised on 14.11.2011 under the provisions of the Special Marriage Act. According to the petitioner, she was selected through campus recruitment and joined a company at Bangalore in July 2015. In November 2015, she brought the respondent also to Bangalore, where they resided together in a rented house. At that time, the respondent was unemployed. It is alleged that the respondent used to harass the petitioner and had obtained possession of her ATM card, and withdrew money from her account. The petitioner further contended that, in order to avoid his ill-treatment, she paid substantial amounts to the respondent till 31.01.2020. Owing to threats extended by the respondent, she transferred an amount of Rs.3,44,367/- from her account maintained with Kotak Mahindra Bank to the respondent's bank account. When the respondent compelled her to pay him Rs.50,000/- by prematurely closing a recurring deposit maintained in her name with Kotak Mahindra Bank, she closed the deposit on 28.07.2019 and paid the amount to him on 09.08.2019. The petitioner also alleged that the respondent forcibly took possession of her Hyundai Grand i10 Sportz car and kept it unused for a considerable period, compelling her to spend Rs.12,566/- towards its repair.

3. The respondent resisted the petition contending that the allegations are false. According to him, he had neither taken possession of the petitioner's ATM card nor appropriated any money. He contended that it was he who had taken the petitioner to Bangalore, accommodated her initially in a paying guest facility and thereafter arranged a rented house in November 2015 by spending his own money. He further asserted that he had independent earnings as an electrical worker in Bangalore. He denied having received any amount from the petitioner.

4. The above case was tried jointly with a petition filed by the petitioner seeking dissolution of marriage. The evidence in this case consists of the oral testimony of PWs 1 to 3 and RW1, and documentary evidence marked as Exts. A1 to A13 series and Exts. B1 series to B3 series.

5. The trial court partly decreed the petition and passed the following decree:

                  “1 A decree is passed permitting the petitioner to realize a sum of Rs.12,566/- with 6% interest per annum from the date of petition till its realization from the respondent and his assets.

                  2. A decree is passed permitting the petitioner to realize a sum of Rs.50,000/- with 6% interest per annum from the date of petition till its realization from the respondent and his assets.

                  3. A decree is passed permitting the petitioner to realize a sum of Rs.3,44,367/- with 6% interest per annum from the date of petition till its realization from the respondent and his assets.

                  4. The petitioner is entitled to realise the costs of the proceedings from the respondent.”

5. We have heard Sri.M.B.Sandeep, the learned counsel appearing for the appellant/respondent and Sri. P.M.Muhammed Ayub, the learned counsel appearing for the respondent/petitioner.

6. In the light of the rival contentions, the point that arises for determination is whether the petitioner is entitled to recover from the respondent the amount awarded by the trial court.

7. The claims made by the petitioner, which have been accepted under the impugned decree, are under three heads. The first claim is for recovery of a sum of Rs.12,566/- with interest, being the amount allegedly spent by the petitioner towards the repair of her car consequent to the damage caused during its use by the respondent. In support of the said claim, the petitioner relied on Ext.A6 series. The respondent has not disputed this claim when PW1 (the petitioner) was cross examined. He has also admitted that the car was used by him. Hence, we find no reason to interfere with the findings of the trial court.

8. The next claim is for recovery of Rs.50,000/- with interest, which, according to the petitioner, she was compelled to pay the respondent by prematurely closing a recurring deposit maintained in her name. The petitioner has specifically narrated, in paragraph 13 of the petition, the circumstances under which she was constrained to close the recurring deposit account maintained with Kotak Mahindra Bank and pay the amount to the respondent. Paragraph 13 reads thus:

                 

                  The respondent has made only an evasive denial for the contentions raised as above. He has stated in paragraph 11 of the counter as follows:

                  “The averments stated in the 13th and 14th paragraphs are also false and hence denied. The respondent is not aware of closing of any recurring deposit of the petitioner and he has not obtained any amount from her as  stated  in  the  said  paragraph.”

9. When examined as PW1, the petitioner reiterated her case regarding the premature closure of the recurring deposit and the consequent payment of the amount to the respondent. Nothing worthwhile was elicited in her cross-examination to discredit or diminish the evidentiary value of the statements made by her in the chief-examination affidavit in that regard. Ext.A5 bank statement produced by the petitioner shows that the amount was withdrawn on 09.08.2019. In the above circumstances, we find the petitioner's version regarding the withdrawal of the amount and its subsequent payment to the respondent to be probable. Accordingly, the claim made by the petitioner in this regard merits acceptance.

10. The third claim of the petitioner is for recovery of a sum of Rs.3,44,367/-, which, according to her, was transferred to the respondent through her bank account, as evidenced by Ext.A5. The respondent denied the said allegation in his counter statement.

11. The learned counsel for the appellant vehemently contended that a close scrutiny of Ext.A5 would reveal that the amounts transferred by the wife to the husband formed part of the normal financial transactions between spouses for meeting their day-to-day needs and expenses. According to the learned counsel, the petitioner is, therefore, not entitled to seek recovery of the said amounts. It was further argued that, even if the petitioner's version is accepted, the amounts cannot be treated as funds entrusted to the respondent for any specific purpose or for the benefit of the matrimonial relationship and, consequently, no obligation can be fastened on the respondent to return the same.

12. We have carefully examined Ext.A5, the statement of account maintained by the petitioner with Kotak Mahindra Bank for the period from 01.08.2017 to 01.03.2020. The details of the amounts shown therein as having been transferred by the petitioner to the respondent, together with the corresponding descriptions appearing in the statement of account, are extracted below:

                 

                 

13. It is pertinent to note from the descriptions accompanying the transactions that several of the payments were made by the petitioner under captions such as “MB FOR MY HERO”, “gift”, or “monthly expenses”. Such payments were not isolated transactions. The nature and frequency of these transactions, viewed in conjunction with the amounts involved in the remaining transfers, indicate that they were gratuitous payments exchanged between spouses in the ordinary course of their matrimonial relationship.

14. The learned counsel appearing for the respondent, placing reliance on the decision of this Court in Royson Mathew v. Minimol K. and Others [2020 (3) KHC 307], persuasively argued that, where payments are made under threat or coercion, recovery thereof cannot be defeated by invoking the plea that the payments were gratuitous in nature or by relying on the principle underlying Section 70 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872. However, the very descriptions accompanying the transactions, extracted above, render the petitioner's allegation that the payments were made under coercion or as a consequence of ill-treatment highly improbable. Therefore, the petitioner’s claim for the recovery of the above amounts is not entertainable.

15. The trial court failed to advert to the aforesaid aspects and consequently erred in granting a decree for recovery of the said amount. While we affirm the findings of the trial court in respect of the amounts awarded under the other two heads, which have already been dealt with hereinbefore, the direction permitting recovery of Rs.3,44,367/- from the respondent cannot be sustained.

                  In the result, the appeal is allowed in part. The impugned decree is modified by setting aside the direction for recovery of Rs.3,44,367/- from the appellant/respondent. The rest of the directions in the decree are upheld.