The Supreme Court today held that daughters would have equal coparcenery rights in Hindu Undivided Family (HUF) properties even if they were not alive at the time of the 2005 amendment to the Hindu Succession Act, 1956. (Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma).
In effect, the Court has ruled that the 2005 amendment would have retrospective effect in conferring rights on daughters who were alive at the time of the amendment, even if they were born prior to it.
A three-Judge Bench of Justices Arun Mishra, S Abdul Nazeer and MR Shah passed the verdict in appeals raising the issue of whether the amendment to the Act granting equal rights to daughters to inherit ancestral property would have retrospective effect.
Recognizing the importance of conferring equal rights on daughters and sons, Justice Mishra, while reading out the operative part of the judgment said,
“Daughters have to be given equal share of coparcenary rights in share of property like the son.”
The issue raised before the Supreme Court was whether with the passing of Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005, a daughter of a coparcener shall by birth become a coparcener in her own right in the same manner as the son. In other words, whether a daughter could be denied her share on the ground that she were born prior to the enactment of the Act and, therefore, cannot be treated as coparcener?
The lead case in this batch of appeals was a challenge to the decision of the Delhi High Court which highlighted the difference in opinion between benches of the Supreme Court.
In the current case, the Delhi High Court granted a certificate of fitness to appeal having regard to the fact that there are conflicting decisions of the Supreme Court in Prakash v. Phulavati, Danamma @ Suman Surpur v. Amar, and Mangammal v. TB Raju.
In Prakash v. Phulavati, the Supreme Court had held that “the rights under the amendment are applicable to living daughters of living coparceners as on 9-9-2005 irrespective of when such daughters are born.” In other words, if the coparcener (father) had passed away prior to September 9, 2005 (date on which the amendment came into effect), the living daughter of the coparcener would have no right to coparcenary property.
In Danamma v. Amar, the Supreme Court had held that the 2005 amendment confers upon the daughter the status of acoparcener in her own right in the same manner as the son. Thus, it confers equal rights and liabilities in the coparcener properties to daughters and sons.
In November 2018, a three-Judge Bench headed by Justice AK Sikri had noted that the matter needed to be heard by a three-Judge Bench.
