Maintenance litigation has acquired a distinctly modern exhibit: the matrimonial profile. A husband who described himself on a marriage portal as a businessman earning in lakhs per month appears in court pleading losses; a biodata circulated by the family boasts of property that the assets affidavit never mentions. Can the figure from the shaadi profile fix the maintenance? The answer courts have worked out is balanced: such claims are relevant material and may call for an explanation, but they are not, by themselves, proof of income — the wedding market runs on puffery, and quantum must ultimately rest on the disclosure regime of affidavits, returns and records. This explainer sets out how each side should handle biodata evidence.
Why biodata evidence is everywhere
Most arranged matches today begin on portals or through circulated biodatas, and those documents are drafted to impress: incomes rounded generously upward, family businesses described at their most prosperous, properties listed without encumbrances. When the marriage fails and maintenance is contested, the same documents resurface — now wielded by the claimant as an admission of means, and disowned by their maker as marketing. Both instincts contain a truth, and the law\'s task is to hold them in proportion.
The evidentiary character of a profile figure
It is an admission…
A statement of income made by a party, in a document he created or used, can be put to him and calls for an explanation. Silence or evasion lets the court draw inferences.
…but not a measurement
Marriage-market statements are made without verification and with an incentive to inflate. Standing alone, they are too fragile to found a finding of actual income.
Proof must be formal
Portal profiles are electronic records: printouts need certification under Section 63 BSA (the successor to Section 65B), and authorship or use must be established, usually in cross-examination.
Where the figure actually lands in the analysis
The operative framework remains the disclosure regime consolidated in Rajnesh v. Neha: both parties file affidavits of assets, income and liabilities; quantum follows the status of the parties, reasonable needs, incomes and earning capacities, and the standard of living in the matrimonial home. Within that framework, a biodata figure does three jobs:
Handling the issue from each side
| If you are the claimant | If you are the respondent |
|---|---|
| Preserve the profile early — dated screenshots or downloads with the certification needed for electronic records; portals delete profiles after marriage. | Do not simply deny the document; explain the figure\'s basis or its author, and reconcile it with your disclosures. |
| Plead it as one strand among several: returns, bank summons, lifestyle, business turnover. | File a complete, conservative and accurate affidavit — an understated affidavit beside an inflated profile is the worst combination. |
| Confront the maker in cross-examination and pin authorship or use. | Remember that exaggeration in a biodata is not an offence, but a false affidavit in court is — perjury exposure attaches to the sworn document. |
The larger lesson
Courts fixing maintenance are engaged in a reconstruction of economic reality between two people with every incentive to distort it in opposite directions. The matrimonial profile is a small, vivid piece of that reconstruction — a party\'s own portrait of his prosperity, painted when impressing rather than resisting. It will rarely decide the case alone, but it reliably decides something subtler: whom the court believes. Parties, and the families who draft biodatas for them, should write nothing in the marriage market that they cannot stand behind in a courtroom.
This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. The weight given to any document depends on proof, attribution and the full evidentiary record of the case.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can maintenance be fixed solely on income claimed in a matrimonial profile?
Generally no. A profile or biodata figure is an out-of-court statement made in a setting notorious for exaggeration. Courts treat it as a relevant circumstance that shifts an explanatory burden onto its maker, but quantum is fixed on the totality: affidavits of assets and liabilities, income-tax returns, bank statements and proved lifestyle — not on the advertisement alone.
Is a matrimonial profile admissible at all?
Yes, as an admission by the party who made or authorised it, subject to proof. Since profiles are electronic records, the certification requirements for electronic evidence must be met — under Section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, which replaced Section 65B of the Evidence Act — typically through a certificate accompanying the printout or download.
What if the profile was created by family members?
Attribution matters. A party can be confronted with a profile he created or knowingly used; a document drafted by relatives without his involvement carries less weight, though prolonged use of the profile for matchmaking makes disavowal difficult. Cross-examination usually settles whether the figure was the party's own representation.
How do courts determine real income when documents look understated?
Through the disclosure framework the Supreme Court standardised in Rajnesh v. Neha (2020): sworn affidavits from both sides, scrutiny of returns and bank accounts, and where disclosure is evasive, assessment of notional income from the standard of living, business turnover, property holdings and expenditure. Demonstrated spending that outruns declared income is routinely decisive.