An Indian-origin banker in the UK has been ordered to make payments to his ex-wife from pension funds he had transferred out to India, in a High Court ruling that has been described as "landmark".
The Goyal v Goyal case in the Family Division involves a long-running divorce battle between Amit and Ankita Goyal and strikes a blow at attempts by divorcing spouses to trying to conceal their assets overseas.
"There are powerful reasons for making a supplementary periodical payments order in favour of the wife," Justice Mostyn said in his ruling, published last month.
Under his order, the wife will receive new periodical payments of around 5,200 pounds per annum, which add up to 100 pounds per week.
"This is a very small sum objectively, but it will be a meaningful sum for her as she attempts to rebuild her life and to support their child. It will end, of course, if she were to remarry, which she hopes to do," the judge added.
The law in Britain provides that a pension may be divided between divorcing spouses by means of a pension sharing order pursuant to the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973. However, a previous judgment of the Court of Appeal in this case had decided that pension sharing pursuant to Section 24B did not apply to foreign pensions.
One of the husband's submissions to the UK Court of Appeal was that it was not possible for the court to make a pension sharing order in respect of overseas pensions and the wife had failed to show that the pension sharing order would be enforceable in India.
However, the latest ruling decided that it was open to the court to order the UK-based husband to make payments from the annuity to the wife as maintenance payments. "This is a landmark judgment in a running financial remedy case which relates to foreign pension which husband had transferred out of UK