A three-judge Bench comprising of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud and Justices J.B. Pardiwala and Manoj Misra however held that children born in such marriage do have a right to inherit their parent’s property.
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THE Supreme Court has held that children born in a void or voidable marriage have the right to inherit their parent’s property.
A three-judge Bench held this on Monday while also holding that such children cannot inherit share as coparceners in the coparcenary property like a legitimate child.
The Bench held that placing the children born in a void or voidable marriage on equal footing as a coparcener would be contrary to the plain meaning of Section 16(3) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 which recognises rights of ‘illegitimate children’ only in the property of the parents.
The Bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud and Justices J.B. Pardilwala and Manoj Misra, however, clarified that once the share of the deceased coparcener in property that would have been allotted to him if a partition had taken place immediately before his death is ascertained, his heirs including the children who have been conferred with legitimacy under Section 16 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, will be entitled to their share in the property which would have been allotted to the deceased upon the notional partition, if it had taken place.
The Bench was answering a reference made to it by a two-judge Bench of the Supreme Court.
The reference essentially raises the following issue: whether a child who is conferred with legislative legitimacy under Section 16(1) or 16(2) is, by reason of Section 16(3), entitled to the ancestral or coparcenary property of the parents or is the child merely entitled to the self-earned or separate property of the parents.
Section 16(3) of the Hindu Marriage Act, provides that the conferment of legitimacy will not confer upon the child rights in or to the property of a person other than the parents.
Interpreting Section 16 of the Hindu Marriage Act, the Bench opined that Section 16(3) represents a balancing act by the legislature when it stipulates that a child who is legitimate in terms of sub-section (1) or (2) of Section 16 would have rights in or to the property only of the parents and not of any other person.
The Bench held that the legislature has not stipulated that a child whose legitimacy is protected by sub-section (1) or sub-section (2) of Section 16 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 would become a coparcener by birth.
On the other hand, the express language used in sub-section (3) of Section 16 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 is that the conferment of legitimacy shall not be construed as conferring any rights in or to the property of any person other than the parents.
“As we have already noted earlier, the very concept of a coparcener postulates the acquisition of an interest by birth.
“If a person born from a void or voidable marriage to whom legitimacy is conferred by sub-sections (1) or (2) of Section 16 were to have an interest by birth in a Hindu Undivided Family governed by Mitakshara law, this would certainly affect the rights of others apart from the parents of the child.
“Holding that the consequence of legitimacy under sub-sections (1) or (2) of Section 16 is to place such an individual on an equal footing as a coparcener in the coparcenary would be contrary to the plain intendment of sub-section (3) of Section 16 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 which recognises rights to or in the property only of the parents,” the Bench held.
The Bench thus held that individuals who have been conferred legitimacy under Section 16(1) and 16(2) of the Hindu Marriage Act, would have rights in or to the absolute property of the parents and no other person.
The Bench clarified that its judgment was confined to Joint Hindu Families governed by Mitakshara law and that it had not dwelt upon the interpretation of the provisions of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 in relation to Joint Hindu families of that class.
The Bench directed the registry to send a copy of the judgment to all the high courts to ensure that all pending cases involving the issues decided by it are listed for hearing and disposal before the assigned Benches according to the rosters of work.
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