DAUGHTER REMAINS A DAUGHTER BUT SON IS A SON UNTIL HE GETS WIFE

" Daughter remains a daughter and son remains a son until he gets a wife",this beautiful line said by Supreme Court in the landmark judgement given on Hindu succession act of 1956.See,the question was whether the daughters have rights over the ancestral property?The Supreme Court gave the answer by these beautiful lines.This is so ironical,on one side women are fighting for getting permanent post in combat,equal rights,feminism and here we are again back to the scratch. 

See,the Hindu succession act 1956,which provides for succession and inheritance of ancestral property states that in a Hindu joint family only the male child being recognized as a legal heir to ancestral property whereas the female sibling of the male child has no claim and this discretionary law of succession and inheritance found in Mitakshara School of Hindu law was codified in Hindu succession act.This law applies to Hindu,Brahmans,Sikhs,Jains as well as the follower of Arya Samaj and Brahmo Samaj.This discretionary provision against the female child is extension of orthodox patriarchal rule found in religious law.But even though the HSA does not apply for Muslims,Christian,Parsis and Jews such discretionary laws of patriarchal and succession can be found in other religion as well but in different form and differnt variation e.g. in Islam there is no such distinction created between female and male child when it comes to succession both the male and female child are recognized as legal heirs to ancestral property but in practice the female child is given only half of the shares as compared to male child.

So, in order to address this discriminatory nature of Hindu Succession act,this law was amended in 2005 and under section 6 oh HSA 2005,the daughters were also recognized as coparcener and equal rights to ancestral property was recognized by birth.In legal terms coparcener basically refers to birth right to ancestral property.The amendment introduced to HSA was in line to recommendation of 174 law commission and it was designed to address the gender based discrimination with regard to succession and inheritance of ancestral property.But this gender based discrimination does not end even after the introduction of amendment by 2005 because of the confusion surrounding interpretation of section 6 of HSA.

See,the amendment act came into effect from 9 September,2005 so it was not clear whether the amendment provision of section 6 would be applicable from 9 September,2005 onward or would it have a retrospective application that is amended provision apply for previous cases or not that is before the amended act came into effect.So,while interpreting the this confusion of section 6 of amended act the Supreme Court and High Court took a different views in multiple cases .In 2005 case SC declare that the amended provision of section 6 would apply only if the daughter and father are living as of 9 September,2005.So,basically this ruling of SC does not involve retrospective application of law and with respect to cases arising before 9 September,2005 gender based discrimination continued under HSA. Then in 2018 SC had ruled that section 6 of HSA also applied retrospectively.So,through the latest judgement SC has clarified its position and it has settled the confusion surrounding the interpretation of section 6.The SC had ruled that daughters have equal right to inherit the property and this position lies retrospectively.