Son asked to pay maintenance slams father

Date

July 12, 2009

Post by

arZan

“For two minutes, imagine yourself in my place as a young boy seeing his mother being hammered savagely and vomiting blood. Her screams
still ring in my ears. Even animals are better than this man. What would you do with a father who destroyed your mother and your life and left you nothing but misery and lifelong scars. How much money will you pay a man like this?”

It was with this intensity that Pesi Satarawala wrote to TOI in response to a report that appeared on June 9, 2009, that a court in Navsari in South Gujarat had again served a notice to this non-resident Indian and now a US citizen to pay a monthly maintenance of Rs 5,000 to his father, Aspi Satarawala.

Community newsletters have been flooded with responses supporting Pesi Satarawala (41) against Aspi (65). On May 31 last year, Navsari’s judicial magistrate first class passed an ex parte order for payment of maintenance.

The latest TOI report last month was based on a fresh court notice sent to Pesi to be present on June 29. Pesi, however, abstained again saying his lawyers were still examining the case. He says all the notices were being sent to Chennai, where his in-laws live, and he was not aware of the legal proceedings till now.

“I came to know about all this two weeks ago. My lawyers are now reviewing the case and will take all legal action as necessary to expose a fraud and evil man like him. We will produce all the legal documents including my mom’s divorce papers in court,” Pesi told TOI in an email.

Pesi went ahead and raised the larger issue of “maintenance laws like these, passed with a noble intention, being misused by deadbeat parents who have disowned and dumped their children when they are small”.

When confronted by TOI with what his son Pesi had to say, Aspi said, “Why is he not coming to the court? For a moment, let us believe that I have not taken care of him, but I am still his father. He should come to the court and I will accept whatever the court decides.”

“From the time I was 7 till today, I have not seen him. I am 41 now. For 34 years, he did not even bother to look at us. After I came to America, his love for me grew by leaps and bounds and he sent me a email of how much he misses me and since I am in America and making money, I should let him stay with me,” replied Pesi.

Original article here.