Daughters entitled to equal property right under Hindu Succession Act: Supreme Court
A three-judge bench headed justice arun mishra said, “Daughters must be given equal eights as sons, Daughter remains a loving daughter throughout life. The daughter shall remain a co-parcener throughout life, irrespective of whether her father is alive or not”.
The Hindu Succession Act, 1956 is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted to amend and codify the law relating to intestate or unwilled succession, among Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, and Sikhs. The Act lays down a uniform and comprehensive system of inheritance and succession into one Act. The Hindu woman's limited estate is abolished by the Act. Any property possessed by a Hindu female is to be held by her absolute property and she is given full power to deal with it and dispose it off by will as she likes. Parts of this Act were amended in 2005 by the Hindu Succession Amendment Act.
The bench was hearing a batch of appeals that raised an important legal issue whether the Hindu Succession(Amendment) which gave equal rights to daughters in ancestral property, has a retrospective effect.
The apex court in its ruling added that daughters will have the right over parental property even if the co-parcener had died prior to the coming into force of the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005. According to a report in Live Law, a three judge bench that comprised Justice Arun Mishra , S Abdul Nazeer and MR Shah pronounced the judgment in a batch of appeals that raised an important legal issue whether the Hindu Succession (Amendment).
In 2018, the Supreme Court has re-affirmed that a daughter of a co-parcener shall by birth become a co-parcener in her own right in the same manner as the son. Last year, in a landmark judgment that will benefit millions of women and their children, the Supreme Court has held that a 2005 law that made the daughters equal to the sons in claiming right in their father’ s property will have retrospective effect in case of daughters born prior to the law coming into force on September 9, 2005.
The 2005 amendment to the Hindu Succession Act did not provide its retrospective operation. A Bench of Justices A K Sikri and Ashok Bhushan ruled that "sons and daughters of a coparcener become coparceners by virtue of birth" and as such the amendment gives all Hindu women, irrespective of birth date, share in father’ s property.
The case relates to one Gurulingappa Savadi, who died in 2001, leaving behind his two sons, two daughters and a widow. A year later, his grandson filed a suit for partition of the family property, leaving out his two aunts, i.e. daughters of late Savadi. The aunts went to court seeking their share in father’s property. The trial court’s decision came on August 9, 2007, almost two years after the Hindu Succession Act, 1958, was amended.
Confusion prevailed on this subject in the past as a full Bench of the Bombay High Court held that the daughters born prior to the date when the law was amended will not have any part in their father’ s property. The High Courts of Delhi, Orissa and Karnataka took a different view, holding that daughter born prior to the amendment but who are alive on the date when the amendment came into force will be equally entitled as sons to the share in father’ s property.