The general rule is, thus, summed up by the Fatwai Alamgiri: ’the children are required to support their aged and infirm parents so far as they are not able to support themselves”. Under Muslim law, the obligation to maintain poor parents rests on sons and daughters provided that they have means. If some of the children are themselves poor, then the obligation lies on those who are in easy circumstances.
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Muslim law lays down the following conditions for the maintenance of parents and grandparents: (i) the maintainer should be in easy circumstances, and (ii) the claimant should be poor.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
A person, who has sufficient means to be prevented from accepting alms, is considered to be a person in easy circumstances. A person, who cannot be prevented from begging, is poor.
Under the Hanafi law as between the father and the mother, the latter has a preferential right of maintenance. Under the Ithana Ashar law, both the parents have equal right of maintenance, and whatever sum a son or daughter can pay towards the maintenance of his or he parents should be, if necessary, divided equally between both the parents.
If a person earns something but has no surplus to maintain his parents, then the court will not pass an order asking him to provide maintenance for his parents. In such circumstances the son may b asked to bring the father into his family and maintain him like one of the family.
The Muslim authorities hold the view that when a person is unable to provide separate maintenance for his parents, he may be compelled to take his parents home with him. If a person is in easy circumstances, then Muslim law enjoins upon him to provide reasonable maintenance for his parents.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
The obligation to maintain parents is that of children, sons as we as daughters. No one else has this obligation. Whether the obligation to maintain the parents, who are able to earn, exists, the Muslim authorities differ.
The majority of Hanafi authorities seem to answer the question affirmatively, while the Shia authorities answer it negatively since among them the general rule is that no one has an obligation to maintain another who is able to earn.
A Muslim has an obligation to maintain his poor grandparents, both maternal and paternal. The obligation is of the same nature as of the parents. However, if one’s father or mother is alive, then one has no obligation to maintain his grandparents, since the children have a prior obligation to maintain their parents.
Parents and grandparents are entitled to maintenance even if they have ceased to be Muslims.