Chennai: Mother demands son pay hospital bill
Padmini’s final hearing is scheduled for September 19
By : johanna deeksha
Update: 2015-09-01 05:11 GMT
Chennai: Harassment, cheating and mounting hospital bills led to 56-year old S. Padmini filing a case against her son Suresh Kumar under the little known Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007. Even though her son abandoned her eight years ago, when he managed to register Padmini’s own house in his name without her knowledge, she decided to seek justice through the Act in June 2014.
While at the Family Court to produce all her medical documents, Padmini spoke about how she had spent her whole life working two jobs, determined to get her son well educated. “He wanted to do a catering course and I made sure he had whatever he needed to excel and after doing so much, now he calls me names, abuses me and doesn’t even care if I’m going hungry,” she wept.
Padmini’s husband has also abandoned her and is allegedly hand in glove with her son in depriving her of basic necessities. Padmini is a heart patient and is in need of surgery on both her knees, all costing up to Rs 9 lakh.
She also has a daughter who has been supporting her throughout the ordeal, "It's okay if I don't get a share in the house but my mother doesn't deserve to suffer like this," she said.
While the son insists that he has no money to pay for his mother's surgery, Padmini claims that her son earns well, sometimes upto 3000-4000 rupees per day in tips as a bartender at League Club in Arumbakkam even as he reportedly owns smaller hotels in other parts of the city. Both of Suresh Kumar's children also study at the prestigious Vivekananda School, proving that he can afford to contribute to his mother's surgery or at least provide maintenance. Padmini is also forbidden from seeing her grandchildren whose photos she carries in her purse," They say that they can't talk to me because their father would beat them, I don't know how I gave birth to such a horrible person."
Along with taking the house in his name, Padmini has also claimed in her petition that her son has wiped clean her husband and her bank accounts where she had saved nearly Rs 20 lakh of her hard earned money.
"My husband and I never got along but we saved that money together and now he and my son have completely emptied it and I am left with nothing". Unable to even sit upright due to her various health issues, the distraught mother said she hoped justice would be done but was skeptical because the judge said that it would be easier to get the money if she went through with the heart surgery first and then made her son pay . Padmini's final hearing is scheduled for September 19 and she hopes that her son, who has shown up only once at the court in the last 14 months, will at least attend the hearing this time.