On 28 September 2001, a five-judge Constitution Bench upheld the constitutional validity of the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986 — but read its principal provision as requiring the husband to make reasonable and fair provision for the maintenance of the divorced wife beyond the iddat period, including for her future. The judgment is the foundational doctrinal contribution that preserved the maintenance architecture of Shah Bano through interpretation of the 1986 Act, and supplies the doctrinal frame within which the more recent Mohd Abdul Samad v. State of Telangana operates.
On 10 July 2024, a two-judge bench of Justices B.V. Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih held that a divorced Muslim woman is entitled to claim maintenance under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (now Section 144 of the BNSS, 2023) against her husband, and that the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986 operates in addition to — not in derogation of — that secular maintenance right. The judgment is the most consequential restoration of the Shah Bano line in the post-1986 period.