Hindu society’s norms should not be challenged for property rights: SC
The Supreme Court upheld the Hindu Succession Act, asserting inheritance norms prioritize a woman's husband's family, not gender inequality, urging legislative changes only.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday asserted that the established norms of Hindu society should not be challenged solely for financial gain, as it observed that the Hindu Succession Act of 1956, which prioritises a woman’s husband’s family over her parents in inheritance matters if she dies intestate (without a will), is not an issue of gender inequality.
The court said Parliament has crafted a “scientific and logical” framework for inheritance, and any changes should come from the legislative body, if deemed necessary.
“It’s clearly not about gender justice. It’s about parents asking for properties of their daughter who is no more. But tell us, what about the woman who leaves her parental home, goes to her matrimonial home where she has a right to be maintained under the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act. How can this be about gender justice? It cannot be. We are not talking about a woman’s right but the rights of a deceased woman’s parents or someone else over her properties,” a bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Pankaj Mithal remarked.
The court was emphatic that a battle over properties cannot undermine the values of Hindu society. “You don’t forget Hindu society. What happens after marriage? The woman gets a new gotra, new family and all rights and titles in her husband’s properties. You are forgetting the basics. Where are we going? Don’t undermine the established tenets of Hindu society,” it asserted.
The bench added: “Please, understand the foundation of Hindu society before you say I am entitled or someone else in entitled. When Parliament has said only a certain class of heirs are entitled, can you say I am also entitled? Let Parliament create a right.”
The court remarked that the line of inheritance seemed “carefully drafted” in the statute. “If the properties have come from her parents, they will get it. If the properties have come from her husband and in-laws, it will go to them. How can other relations claim? It’s so scientific and logical,” it stressed.
The observations by the top court came while hearing a set of challenge to the scheme of the 1956 Act, which creates two different sets of succession in cases of men and women dying intestate.
Under the law, when a Hindu man dies, the properties left behind by him are to be distributed equally among his wife, children and his mother. If there is no such successor living on that day, the properties of a Hindu man go to his father.
However, under sections 15 and 16 of the Act, when a Hindu woman dies intestate, her properties, including self-acquired assets, shall be inherited by her children and husband. If the woman has no living husband or children, the heirs of the husband shall inherit the property. Only in the event that the woman’s husband has no heirs shall the property be inherited by the woman’s parents. Furthermore, the property of a woman goes back to a source from whom she inherited the property such as father, husband and the father-in-law if it is not her self-acquired property. Here again, even if a woman inherits from her mother, her father’s heirs succeed the property.
The first petition filed in the Supreme Court in 2018 by Mumbai-resident Kamal Anant Khopkar, who was represented by advocates Mrunal Dattatraya Buva, challenged the validity of the contentious provisions of the succession law. A series of petitions followed which were taken up together by the bench on Wednesday. While Khopkar’s petition was wrapped up on Wednesday as the parties had reached a settlement, the bench agreed to consider related legal issues in ongoing petitions, where family members of deceased women were contesting the rights of the in-laws over the deceased’s assets.
Emphasising the cultural roots of Hindu inheritance practices, the court expressed concern over a shift in values. “There are villages in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar where a married woman’s parents do not even drink water in the place they have married their daughters. This is the kind of sentiments we have in Hindu families. And here we have sisters and brothers and even sister-in-law pressing for her properties. Where are we going with all this?” it asked.
Highlighting that a married woman is free to make a will to distribute her property as she wishes, the court observed that legislative changes, if necessary, should reflect the broad consensus rather than isolated claims.
“A husband might have earned properties in partnership with his brother or other family members. He gives his properties to the wife and now the sister or brother, who is stranger to her in terms of inheritance after the marriage, wants to stake claim. When she has gone to another family, what right can her sister have in her properties?” it questioned.
Ultimately, the bench postponed further hearing to January 16 to await the central government’s affidavit on the matter, while also observing that there could be arguable issues pertaining to the devolution of self-acquired properties of a female Hindu dying intestate.
In February 2019, a Supreme Court bench headed by justice Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud sought a response from the central government, saying that “the writ petition filed before this court under section 32 raises an important question of gender equality”.
Defending the provisions, the Union government filed its reply in May 2022 in Khopkar’s petition, arguing that previous Supreme Court rulings have ratified the law. It cited a 2009 judgment which decided in favour of property rights of a woman to the husband’s brother even though the women stayed for 42 years with her parents following the husband’s death after the marriage. Sentiments and sympathy cannot be a guiding principle to determine the interpretation of law and it should not be interpreted in a manner that was not envisaged by the legislature, the Supreme Court said in that judgment.
Relying on that judgment, the central government maintained: “It is a well settled law that because a law causes hardship, it cannot be interpreted to defeat its objective.”
Ruling out the possibility of any amendment in the Act in the near future, the affidavit had added that although certain recommendations have been made by the Law Commission and the National Commission for Women to put men and women on a par in matters of succession and inheritance, views of all the states and Union territories are required to be gathered before considering the matter further.
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