New Delhi: A Hindu woman or girl will have
equal property rights along with other male relatives for any
partition made in intestate succession after September 2005,
the Supreme Court has ruled.
A bench of justices RM Lodha and Jagdish Singh Khehar in
a judgement said that under the Hindu Succession (Amendment)
Act, 2005, the daughters are entitled to equal inheritance
rights along with other male siblings, which was not available
to them prior to the amendment.
The apex court said the female inheritors would not
only have the succession rights but also the same liabilities
fastened on the property along with the male members.
"The new Section 6 provides for parity of rights in
the coparcenaries property among male and female members of a
joint Hindu family on and from September 9, 2005. The
legislature has now conferred substantive right in favour of
the daughters.
"According to the new Section 6, the daughter of a
coparcener becomes a coparcener by birth in her own rights and
liabilities in the same manner as the son. The declaration in
Section 6 that the daughter of the coparcener shall have same
rights and liabilities in the coparcener property as she
would have been a son is unambiguous and unequivocal, "Justice
Lodha, writing the judgement, said.
The term coparcener refers to the equal inheritance right
of a person in a property.
The apex court passed the ruling while upholding the
appeal filed by Ganduri Koteshwaramma, daughter of late
Chakiri Venkata Swamy, challenging the Andhra Pradesh High
Court`s decision not to recognise equal property rights of
women along with their male siblings.
PTI
