Property Rights of Daughters under Hindu Law

Social justice demands that a woman should be treated equally both in the economic and the social sphere. The exclusion of daughters from participating in coparcener property ownership merely by reason of their sex is unjust.

Earlier, only five States - Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Karnataka - had amended the concept of Mitakshara coparcenary property at the State level to give daughters a share. Parliament then carried out this reform across the whole country through the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005, which amended Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 to provide for the equal distribution of coparcenary property between sons and daughters.

The 2005 amendment changed the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 so that women get an equal share in ancestral property. A daughter can now approach the court seeking a partition from her family/brothers/father. She has equal rights to get her share in the family property. Once acquired, a woman is free to deal with the property the way she likes; it becomes her absolute property and her children have no right to it during her lifetime.

A Daughter can file a suit for partition, on which a certain amount of court fees is payable. This court fee depends on the value of her share in the property and has to be calculated as per court fee chart.

Under the amended Section 6, in a Joint Hindu family the daughter of a coparcener shall -

• by birth becomes a coparcener in her own right in the same manner as the son;
• have the same rights in the coparcener property as she would have had if she had been a son;
• be subject to the same liabilities in respect of the said coparcener property as that of a son, and any reference to a Hindu coparcener shall be deemed to include a reference to a daughter of a coparcener:

These reforms were originally recommended by the Law Commission to remove the pervasive discrimination against women in the laws governing inheritance and succession of property amongst the members of a joint Hindu family under the Hindu Succession Act, 1956.

What were once proposals are now settled law. The Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005 came into force on 9 September 2005 and made every daughter a coparcener by birth in her own right, on the same footing as a son. The Supreme Court has since clarified the scope of this right in Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma (2020), holding that a daughter’s coparcenary right is by birth and applies retroactively - it does not matter whether the father was alive on 9 September 2005, so daughters born before that date also enjoy equal coparcenary rights. Daughters seeking to enforce these rights in Delhi can consult our team for advice on filing a suit for partition or asserting their share in ancestral property.