JUDGMENT P.T. Raman Nayar, J. 1. No error of law unless it be in favour of the appellant the respondent has neither appealed nor filed a memorandum of cross objection and no conflicting finding of fact. 2. The concurrent finding of fact of the courts below is that the respondent wife, now divorced, had, before the divorce, been guilty of a lapse, a solitary lapse, from virtue and that if this be not a valid ground for denying maintenance pendente lite under S.10A of the Madras Marumakkathyam Act (as amended by Kerala Act 26 of 1958 on the lines of S.24 and 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act 1955 the Act for short ) or permanent alimony or maintenance under S.10B : the appellant husband should, having regard to the considerations mentioned in those sections, pay the respondent wife maintenance at the rate of Rs. 12/- per mensem. The first court holding that it was a valid ground for denying maintenance dismissed the wife's applications under those provisions; the lower appellate court while holding that it was not a ground for denying maintenance altogether considered that it was relevant in determining the quantum of maintenance and in that view granted the wife maintenance at the rate of Rs. 8/- per mensem in both applications on the analogy of the "starving maintenance" of the errant but reformed Hindu wife or widow. The husband has come with these second appeals S. A. No. 485 of 1963 in his appeal in the application under S.10A and S. A. No. 546 of 1963 in that under S.10B 3. The question whether an appeal lies at all from orders such as these has not been raised it has been assumed that the effect of S.10B of the Act is that such orders are to be regarded as decrees not merely for purposes of enforcement but also for purposes of appeal. 4. As rightly observed by the court below (though the order it ultimately made ignored this aspect of the matter) the conduct of the parties is not, on the terms of S.10A, a relevant consideration under that provision. 4. As rightly observed by the court below (though the order it ultimately made ignored this aspect of the matter) the conduct of the parties is not, on the terms of S.10A, a relevant consideration under that provision. Unlike S.10B it does not refer to the conduct of parties in setting out the matters to which the court shall have regard in ordering maintenance; S.10B on the other hand expressly refers to the conduct of the parties as one of the matters to which the court shall have regard. Obviously, the legislative intent is that so long as the relationship of husband and wife subsists the spouse who is well off should pay maintenance to the spouse who is not of S.24 and 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act. Moreover, the Act contemplates no inquiry into conduct pending the petition for dissolution. The court below should therefore have awarded maintenance to the respondent at the rate of Rs. 12/- per mensem under S.10A and against its award at the rate of Rs. 8/- per mensem the applicant can certainly have no complaint. 5. In deliberate departure from S.25 of the Hindu Marriage Act, on which it is closely modelled, S.10B of the Act by sub-s.(3) thereof requires that for the recission of an order for maintenance made under sub-s.(1) on the ground of lapse from virtue, the party in whose favour the order was made must have been "leading a life of immorality" S.25(3) of the Hindu Marriage Act on the other hand is, it would appear, satisfied with a single lapse from virtue. I think the lower appellate court was right in holding that if a single lapse from virtue is not enough for the recission of an order for maintenance made under sub-s.(1) of S.10B, it is only reasonable that it should not be a ground for denying maintenance altogether under that sub-section even paying due heed to the circumstance that a solitary lapse from virtue on the part of a married person is a matrimonial offence where as such a lapse on the part of a divorced person obviously is not. Decisions on the question whether the "reasonable excuse" of sub-s.(1) of S.9 of the Hindu Marriage Act is confined to the grounds mentioned in sub-s.(3) are hardly relevant; nor, in the case of a statute which permits free divorce, are the principles of the pre statutory Hindu Law, which did not recognise divorce, regarding the payment of maintenance to a sinning wife or widow. 6. I might add that there is no question of S.24 and 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act overriding the provisions of S.10A and 10B of the Act under S.4(b) of the former Act, firstly because S.10A and 10B of the Act were not in force at the commencement of the Hindu Marriage Act and, secondly, because S.24 and 25 of the Hindu Marriage Act are expressly confined to proceedings under that statute. 7. I dismiss both appeals with costs.