The recent request of a Member of Parliament (MoP) urging the government to include Scheduled Tribe women in the inheritance rights provisions of the Hindu Succession Amendment Act, 2005, brings attention to the issues of inheritance and gender equality in India. The proposed change seeks to correct an exclusion in Section 2(2) of the Act that denies equal property rights to Scheduled Tribe women.
Highlighting the Importance of Equal Inheritance Rights
The Hindu Succession Act, which was amended in 2005, allows daughters to inherit their father’s or Hindu Undivided Family (HUF) properties equally. However, this amendment does not include women from the Scheduled Tribe community, a glaring omission that has been flagged by the MoP. The MoP argues that this exclusion constitutes gender-based discrimination and violates Article 14 of the Indian Constitution, which advocates for legal equality.
Furthermore, the MoP points out that women from Scheduled Tribes face additional hardships due to historical oppression and limited access to education, employment, and property. Therefore, the MoP is advocating for the government to remedy this situation by including Scheduled Tribe women in the Hindu Succession Act, except in instances where the customs of a specific Scheduled Tribe already provide women with better positions.
Understanding the Hindu Succession Act, 1956
The Hindu Succession Act, 1956, a codification of the Mitakshara school of Hindu law, regulates succession and inheritance. Originally, this law only recognized males as legal heirs. It applies to followers of all religions except Islam, Christianity, Parsi, and Judaism. For the purposes of this law, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Arya Samaj, and Brahmo Samaj followers are categorized as Hindus.
The traditional interpretation of this law posits that only male descendants of a common ancestor, along with their mothers, wives, and unmarried daughters, comprise a joint Hindu family. As such, these legal heirs jointly hold the family property.
The Amendment of the Hindu Succession Act in 2005
In September 2005, the original act was modified to recognize women as coparceners (joint heirs) for property partitions initiated from 2005 onwards. This amendment transformed Section 6 of the Act to equate a daughter’s rights with a son’s: she became a coparcener by birth “in her own right in the same manner as the son”. Hence, the daughter was given equivalent rights and liabilities “in the coparcenary property as she would have had if she had been a son”.
This law applies both to ancestral property and to intestate personal property; in the latter case, succession occurs according to the law rather than by will. The current discussions surrounding the Hindu Succession Amendment Act center on whether Scheduled Tribe women should be included in its provisions, in line with the principle of equality and fairness.
Last Modified: February 20, 2024