Karnataka High Court Sets Aside DNA Test Order in Child Maintenance Case

The High Court of Karnataka on November 3, 2026 set aside an order of the Principal Family Court in Bengaluru that had directed a minor girl and her mother to give blood samples for DNA profiling in a maintenance claim against Filix Miller.

Filed through her mother, the maintenance petition named Miller as the father. He denied paternity.

In Bengaluru, the Principal Family Court had allowed an interlocutory plea for the samples under Section 45 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023.

Before Justice Lalitha Kanneganti, his counsel called the direction arbitrary and contrary to Supreme Court precedents.

He argued the trial court recorded no strong prima facie case and left room for what he called a "fishing and roving enquiry" into private life.

Counsel said a test touching legitimacy and bodily integrity needed what he described as "eminent need".

The rejection of a similar request in a related civil suit was cited, along with shifting positions taken by the mother, as signs of absence of bona fides.

An alleged admission of acquaintance, he said, had been treated as enough though it did not establish biological fatherhood.

For the child, counsel argued past contact, monetary support and an admitted physical relationship with the mother made scientific testing the surest way to settle paternity.

The bench said precise techniques now available for establishing biological linkage must be balanced against the guarantee of privacy under Article 21.

It said documents, testimony of witnesses and surrounding circumstances must be examined first under a staged inquiry.

The Court observed: "The court must first consider whether the existing evidence is sufficient to resolve the controversy. Only then should the evidence be found insufficient should DNA examination be considered."

Other evidence must come first

The bench added that concern for welfare could not stand in for that required inquiry.

It remarked: "The welfare of the child, important as it is, cannot be treated as a substitute for the judicial inquiry required before directing DNA examination."

Speed or certainty, the Court said, did not make intrusion permissible. Expediency cannot override privacy.

The order records that paternity is relevant to maintenance under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and the matching provision of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, but liability must rest on proof satisfying proportionality and necessity.

On legitimacy, the Court said the presumption under Section 112 of the Evidence Act for a birth during subsistence of marriage is not displaced by a bare plea of an extra-marital relationship.

It said the party alleging no access between the mother and her spouse at the time of conception bears the burden of proving that claim.

The Family Court, it found, had ordered sampling without examining those statutory conditions and the factual backdrop.

On the earlier civil refusal, the bench said a denial in a distinct proceeding with a different legal setting does not by itself bar a fresh request.

It cautioned that the Family Court must still account for the litigation history to avoid conflicting outcomes and misuse of process.

Any fresh direction for testing, it said, must spell out why other material is inadequate and why the intrusion is needed for a fair adjudication.

The case was sent back for fresh hearing with instructions to assess the mother's claims, the statutory presumptions and whether the remaining evidence suffices before considering DNA analysis.