If Marriage Is Equal, Why Isn’t Alimony?
Nidhi | Nov 10, 2025, 14:39 IST
Marriage
( Image credit : Freepik )
If marriage is built on equality, why isn’t alimony? This question challenges the very idea of fairness in modern relationships. Alimony was meant to protect the financially weaker spouse after divorce, yet it often sparks debate about gender roles and justice. In India, laws like Section 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act ensure support, but they also raise questions — should equality end when marriage does? This article examines the emotional, legal, and ethical sides of alimony in today’s evolving idea of partnership.
Marriage, in theory, ends with love. In reality, it ends with law. What was once a private emotion becomes a public contract, and when it breaks, the cost is not just emotional — it’s financial. That cost has a name: alimony.
For some, it’s justice — a way to protect women who gave up financial independence for family, motherhood, or social expectation. For others, it’s a lifelong bill that turns heartbreak into debt. Between these two truths lies the complexity of modern marriage — where equality is preached but economics still aren’t equal.
In India, Section 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) allows either spouse to claim maintenance — yet in practice, it’s mostly women who do, because the system still reflects the reality that most homes are powered by women’s unpaid labor. Courts calculate alimony based on income, lifestyle, and dependency, not gender. But the perception remains: men pay, women receive.
That’s what makes alimony such a paradox — it exists because equality hasn’t arrived yet, but it also questions whether true equality ever will.
Alimony was never designed as revenge; it was created as relief.
When marriages dissolve, the emotional loss is shared, but the economic loss often isn’t. Historically, women left marriages with little to fall back on — no property, no stable income, no savings. Alimony was meant to ensure that a person who invested years into building a home was not left without means to survive outside it.
Under Section 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) and Section 125 of the CrPC, courts can direct financial support to the dependent spouse, regardless of gender.
Yet, the reality remains: it is mostly women who receive it — not because the law favors them, but because social structures still do not.
Much of what women contribute in marriages isn’t measurable — care, emotional labour, child-rearing, managing households.
It doesn’t reflect in bank accounts, but it shapes families.
When such marriages end, these invisible years often have no monetary equivalent.
Alimony, in that sense, becomes a form of recognition — a way of acknowledging work that was real, but unpaid.
It’s not charity; it’s compensation for choices society encouraged but never valued — leaving jobs for family, prioritizing home over career, and often, giving up independence for love.
And yet, there’s another truth.
For many men, alimony feels less like fairness and more like a fine.
They argue — if marriage is equal, why should one partner keep paying long after separation? Why should financial independence be one-sided when emotional independence is mutual?
In some cases, men continue to pay even when their ex-spouse is educated, employable, and capable of rebuilding life.
The Supreme Court of India, in Kalyan Dey Chowdhury vs. Rita Dey Chowdhury (2017), observed that alimony should not ordinarily exceed 25% of the payer’s net income — an attempt to create balance, but resentment remains.
Because to many, equality begins and ends at love — not at liability.
Equality looks perfect in theory, but not in life.
Even today, women are more likely to take career breaks, earn less, and own fewer assets than men.
According to UN Women, women globally earn nearly 23% less than men for the same work. In India, that gap widens with marriage and motherhood.
So while both partners may start as equals, they rarely end that way.
And that’s what makes alimony relevant. It doesn’t deny equality — it recognizes that real equality still doesn’t exist outside paper.
Alimony is more than money — it’s memory turned into obligation.
For one side, it’s a measure of justice; for the other, a reminder of failure.
It keeps two people tied long after they’ve tried to let go.
But the discomfort is shared.
A woman may receive it and still feel guilt or dependence; a man may pay it and still feel punished for a love that didn’t last.
It’s not about who’s right — it’s about how both are still bound by a system that sees dependence where partnership once existed.
When the law intervenes in relationships, it cannot heal — it can only balance.
Alimony tries to create fairness in a situation that has none.
For the woman who spent years building a life around someone else’s success, it’s a lifeline. For the man who believes in shared independence, it feels like hypocrisy.
Both sides are partly right.
Because equality cannot exist in emotion if it doesn’t exist in economy.
And until every partner leaves a marriage with the same freedom to begin again, alimony will continue to exist — as both justice and burden.
The debate over alimony isn’t really about gender — it’s about transition.
It reflects a society caught between tradition and equality, between love that once meant sacrifice and love that now means choice.
Maybe the real question isn’t whether alimony is fair, but whether our idea of equality is.
Because as long as marriage demands one to give up more — time, work, or self — equality will remain a promise, not a practice.
And that’s why the question still matters:
If marriage is equal, why isn’t alimony?
For some, it’s justice — a way to protect women who gave up financial independence for family, motherhood, or social expectation. For others, it’s a lifelong bill that turns heartbreak into debt. Between these two truths lies the complexity of modern marriage — where equality is preached but economics still aren’t equal.
In India, Section 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) allows either spouse to claim maintenance — yet in practice, it’s mostly women who do, because the system still reflects the reality that most homes are powered by women’s unpaid labor. Courts calculate alimony based on income, lifestyle, and dependency, not gender. But the perception remains: men pay, women receive.
That’s what makes alimony such a paradox — it exists because equality hasn’t arrived yet, but it also questions whether true equality ever will.
1. What Alimony Really Represents
Alimony
( Image credit : Pexels )
When marriages dissolve, the emotional loss is shared, but the economic loss often isn’t. Historically, women left marriages with little to fall back on — no property, no stable income, no savings. Alimony was meant to ensure that a person who invested years into building a home was not left without means to survive outside it.
Under Section 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) and Section 125 of the CrPC, courts can direct financial support to the dependent spouse, regardless of gender.
Yet, the reality remains: it is mostly women who receive it — not because the law favors them, but because social structures still do not.
2. The Work That Was Never Counted
marriage crimes
( Image credit : Freepik )
It doesn’t reflect in bank accounts, but it shapes families.
When such marriages end, these invisible years often have no monetary equivalent.
Alimony, in that sense, becomes a form of recognition — a way of acknowledging work that was real, but unpaid.
It’s not charity; it’s compensation for choices society encouraged but never valued — leaving jobs for family, prioritizing home over career, and often, giving up independence for love.
3. When Fairness Feels One-Sided
Alimony
( Image credit : Freepik )
For many men, alimony feels less like fairness and more like a fine.
They argue — if marriage is equal, why should one partner keep paying long after separation? Why should financial independence be one-sided when emotional independence is mutual?
In some cases, men continue to pay even when their ex-spouse is educated, employable, and capable of rebuilding life.
The Supreme Court of India, in Kalyan Dey Chowdhury vs. Rita Dey Chowdhury (2017), observed that alimony should not ordinarily exceed 25% of the payer’s net income — an attempt to create balance, but resentment remains.
Because to many, equality begins and ends at love — not at liability.
4. When Equality Meets Reality
Alimony
( Image credit : Freepik )
Even today, women are more likely to take career breaks, earn less, and own fewer assets than men.
According to UN Women, women globally earn nearly 23% less than men for the same work. In India, that gap widens with marriage and motherhood.
So while both partners may start as equals, they rarely end that way.
And that’s what makes alimony relevant. It doesn’t deny equality — it recognizes that real equality still doesn’t exist outside paper.
5. The Emotional Equation That Never Ends
Alimony
( Image credit : Freepik )
For one side, it’s a measure of justice; for the other, a reminder of failure.
It keeps two people tied long after they’ve tried to let go.
But the discomfort is shared.
A woman may receive it and still feel guilt or dependence; a man may pay it and still feel punished for a love that didn’t last.
It’s not about who’s right — it’s about how both are still bound by a system that sees dependence where partnership once existed.
6. Between Right and Resentment
Alimony tries to create fairness in a situation that has none.
For the woman who spent years building a life around someone else’s success, it’s a lifeline. For the man who believes in shared independence, it feels like hypocrisy.
Both sides are partly right.
Because equality cannot exist in emotion if it doesn’t exist in economy.
And until every partner leaves a marriage with the same freedom to begin again, alimony will continue to exist — as both justice and burden.
7. The Question That Refuses to Settle
Money
( Image credit : Pexels )
It reflects a society caught between tradition and equality, between love that once meant sacrifice and love that now means choice.
Maybe the real question isn’t whether alimony is fair, but whether our idea of equality is.
Because as long as marriage demands one to give up more — time, work, or self — equality will remain a promise, not a practice.
And that’s why the question still matters:
If marriage is equal, why isn’t alimony?