Mohammed Shami ordered to pay Rs 4 lakh in alimony to wife and daughter after court verdict

Pink Villa

02-07-2025

On July 2, 2025, the Calcutta High Court directed star pacer Mohammed Shami to pay Rs 1.5 lakh per month to his estranged wife, Hasin Jahan, and Rs 2.5 lakh to their daughter, Aaira, totaling Rs 4 lakh in interim maintenance.
The judgment, delivered by Justice Ajoy Kumar Mukherjee, comes after a long-drawn-out divorce battle that began in 2018 when Jahan accused Shami of domestic violence and neglect. The court recognised Jahan's lack of personal income, as she was forced to abandon her modelling career.
Aaira's educational needs were also acknowledged, and a significant change was made to the alimony amount as the earlier district court order had set maintenance to be far lower.
Long-running legal struggle
Shami and Jahan married in April 2014 and had their daughter Aaira in 2015. Their separation in 2018 triggered allegations under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, alongside claims of dowry harassment and financial negligence, as per The Hindu.
Jahan's maintenance plea initially sought Rs 7 lakh for herself and Rs 3 lakh for Aaira, but the sessions court granted just Rs 50,000 and Rs 80,000 respectively in 2023. This prompted her appeal to the High Court, where she argued that Shami had compelled her to quit modelling, leaving her with no means of support, according to NDTV Sports.
She stated to ANI, 'I used to model and act before I got married. That was enough for me then. Shami forced me to quit my profession. He wanted me to live only a housewife's life.' She also explains that, at the time, she loved him enough to accept his wish.
Bench's reasoning: What did the Judge say?
According to Bar and Bench, Justice Mukherjee emphasized Shami's substantial earnings and the standard of living Jahan and Aaira had during the marriage. 'The petitioner wife… is entitled to a levelled maintenance that she enjoyed during her continuance of marriage and which reasonably secures her future as well as the future of the child,' he noted.
The ruling also grants Shami's daughter, Aaira, additional voluntary assistance for education of over Rs 2.5 lakh. The High Court has instructed the trial court to 'dispose of the main application of the interim order within six months,' as per Jahan's lawyer Imtiaz Ahmed.