Children from invalid marriages entitled to parents’ property: Supreme Court

NEW DELHI,SEPT 1 : The Supreme Court held on Tuesday that children born out of invalid marriages are entitled to a share in the property of their parents under Hindu laws.

The verdict came on a plea, pending since 2011, on the legal issue of whether non-marital children were entitled to a share in the ancestral property of their parents or have coparcenary right over the properties belonging to a Hindu Undivided Family.

Last month, a bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra heard submissions of several lawyers on the matter. The top court also took up the question of whether the share of such children is limited only to the self-acquired property of their parents under Section 16(3) of the Hindu Marriage Act. These questions were referred to a larger bench by a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court on March 31, 2011.

Reading out the judgment today, the CJI said, “Once the share of the deceased in the 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, 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.”

Back in 2011, the court had said the provision makes it very clear that a child of a “void or voidable marriage” can only claim rights to the property of his parents, and no one else.

The newly convened bench had disagreed with the earlier findings of the top court that such children will have no right in ancestral properties of their parents. “With changing social norms of legitimacy in every society, including ours, what was illegitimate in the past may be legitimate today. The concept of legitimacy stems from social consensus, in the shaping of which various social groups play a vital role… in a changing society law cannot afford to remain static…,” it had said.

According to Hindu law, in a void marriage, the parties do not have the status of husband and wife. As per the statute, husband and wife have the status in the voidable marriage. In a void marriage, no decree of nullity is required to annul the marriage. While, in a voidable marriage decree of nullity is required.

-The India Today