Continuing maintenance claim: a later application quantifying arrears in a pending proceeding is not barred by limitation.

A timely maintenance proceeding under Section 125(3) CrPC that remains pending is not barred by limitation when a later application merely quantifies arrears accruing during that proceeding. The Court treated maintenance as a continuing social welfare obligation and held that the later application was supplementary to the original claim, not a fresh execution step requiring a separate one-year limitation analysis for each accrual. The one-year proviso did not apply to defeat recovery of arrears already arising within the pending proceeding, so the rejection of the application on limitation grounds could not stand and the maintenance recovery process was directed to continue.

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Issues: Whether an application filed under Section 125(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, during the pendency of the original maintenance proceeding, seeking recovery of arrears accrued up to the date of the later interlocutory application, was barred by limitation under the proviso to that provision.

Analysis: The maintenance petition had been instituted within one year from the date the amount became due and remained pending without the issue of a warrant. The later interlocutory application did not initiate a fresh execution proceeding; it only quantified the arrears that had accumulated during the pendency of the already timely filed proceeding. Section 125 is a social welfare measure and must receive a liberal construction. In such a situation, insisting on successive applications for each later accrual would be unreasonable, because the liability to pay maintenance is continuing and the later application was only supplementary to the original claim already within limitation.

Conclusion: The application was not barred by limitation, and the order rejecting it on that ground could not be sustained.

Final Conclusion: The order of the High Court was set aside and the order of the revisional court was restored, with the maintenance recovery proceeding to continue in accordance with law.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a maintenance proceeding under Section 125(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 is timely instituted and remains pending, a later application merely quantifying subsequent arrears is supplementary and does not attract the one-year bar in the proviso.

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