Effect of Hindu Succession Act on Female Granted Limited Ownership of Property by the Testator by Execution of Will

http://indiankanoon.org/doc/1622720/

Gumpha vs Jaibai 1994 SCC (2) 511, JT 1994 (1) 535

A will was executed in 1941; death of the testator was in 1958; he had two wives, he willed one-half share to each till their life and the only daughter, was to be ultimate beneficiary. One wife died in 1966 and she had executed a will in favour of her domestic servant.  trial court and First Appellate Court held that the life estate created under the will stood converted into absolute estate under Section 14(1) of the Act as it was in recognition of pre-existing right. The High Court did not agree with this and held that the widow could not get larger interest than that was intended by the testator.

Apex court was faced with the question "What is the dichotomy between two sub-sections of Section 14 which forms the bedrock of revolutionary changes brought out in Hindu Law of Succession in 1956."

After noticing the decisions in S.S. Munna Lal v. S.S. Raj Kumar, Kalawatibai v. Soiryabai, Bai Vajia v. Thakorbhai Chelabhai, G. Appaswami Chettiar v. R. Sarangapani Chettiar, In Kothi Satyanarayana v. Galla Sithayya, Eramma v. Verrupanna; Kuldip Singh v. Surain Singh and Dindayal v. Rajaram, Apex court held :

A female Hindu could acquire rights under Section 14(1) only if she was possessed of the property and that possession was by some legal authority. To put it differently a trespasser or a female Hindu who cannot establish any right in the property of which she was possessed could not acquire any right. 

It necessarily follows that the possession must be founded on some basis which may be acceptable in law and the right that she acquires under Section 14 depends on the nature of possession she enjoyed over the property. Consequently if a female Hindu acquires possession after the enforcement of the Succession Act and that possession was traceable to an instrument or a document described in sub- section (2) then she could not get higher right than what is stipulated in the document itself. 

The purpose and the legislative intention which surfaces from a combined reading of the two sub-sections is that it attempts to remove the disability which was imposed by the customary Hindu Law on acquisition of rights by a female Hindu but it does not enlarge or enhance the right which she gets under a will giving her a limited estate under Section 30 of the Act.