Legal Reference Library

Supreme Court: While construing the provisions of Hindu Law Women’s Rights Act, 1933, the Court held that the succession to a Hindu male dying intestate will vest only in the widow under Section 4(1)(ii) to the exclusion of the daughters.  In the present case, two brother and the wife of elder brother constituted a joint Hindu family. The elder brother was the Karta of the said family. Both the brothers had partition and divided their joint family properties. The younger brother died intestate, leaving behind his widow and three daughters. Later, the widow executed a will bequeathing her share in the joint family property in favour of only one of the three daughters. One of the daughters filed a suit claiming her 1/4th share in the property as per Section 10(2)(g) of the 1933 Act. Shri S.N. Bhat, learned counsel of the respondent, also invited the attention of the Court to Section 8(1)(d) of the Act and according to him since joint family property passed to younger brother who wa...

The Supreme Court has ruled that a widow can be a manager of a joint family in some particular circumstances. An apex court bench gave the ruling while deciding a property dispute between cousins of a family in Uttar Pradesh in a suit filed in 1978 in favour of the mother who bought the property. A bench comprising justices Ranjan Gogoi and N V Ramana said, “Such a role (as manager) necessarily has to be distinguished from that of a Karta which position the Hindu widow cannot assume by virtue of her disentitlement to be a coparcener in the Hindu Undivided Family (HUF) of her husband. Regrettably the position remains unaltered even after the amendment of the Hindu Succession Act in 2005.” “Though women could not be treated as Karta of a joint family, she can be a manager of a joint family, in some particular circumstances,” it said. The bench also held that the expression ‘Manager’ can be understood as denoting a role distinct from that of the Karta. The case dates back to 1978, whe...

The right to maintenance of a Hindu widow is not a "mere formality" but a spiritual and moral right that can be judicially enforced upon by claiming "absolute right" on the property given to her for sustaining herself, the Supreme Court has ruled. A bench, headed by Justice M Y Eqbal, while upholding a Andhra Pradesh high court verdict in favour of a widow who had transferred the property willed to her by her husband for her lifetime to a relative, said it was the woman's "absolute right" and she was free to bequeath the property. "It is well settled that under the Hindu Law, the husband has got a personal obligation to maintain his wife and if he is possessed of properties, then his wife is entitled to a right to be maintained out of such properties. "It is equally well settled that the claim of Hindu widow to be maintained is not a mere formality which is to be exercised as a matter of concession, grace or gratis but is a valuable,...

In a judgment, a bench comprising of VM Kanade and CB Colabawalla, JJ  has ruled that a widow, even after she has remarried, has the rights over her former husband's properties. In the present case, the petition was filed by a man against his former sister-in-law who had claimed the right over her deceased husband’s properties after she married another man. The brother of the deceased relied  on the provisions of the  Hindu Widows' Re-marriage Act, 1856, which stated the limited right and interest which a widow had in her deceased husband’s property would cease to exist if she remarries without express permission, and the next heirs of her deceased husband, or other persons entitled to the property, shall thereupon succeed to the same. The Court ruled that provisions of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 would prevail over the repealed Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act, 1856. There was no provision in the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 which was pari materia with section 2 of the ...