Married daughter cannot be denied parental land rights on marital status : HC -

Shimla, Sept 17

In a landmark ruling with wider implications for gender equality in matters relating to parental property, the Himachal Pradesh High Court has held that a daughter cannot be denied her claim over land allotted to her parents merely because she is married. The Court made it clear that the statutory Nautor Land Rules do not create any distinction between a married and unmarried daughter and that an administrative instruction cannot be used to curtail rights available under the statutory rules.

Justice Sandeep Sharma delivered the ruling on September 14 while deciding a petition filed by Shanti, the sole legal heir of her deceased father Mina Ram and mother Sewati Devi. The judgment is particularly relevant to revenue litigation where claims of daughters are sought to be differentiated on the basis of their marital status.

The dispute concerned 3 bighas and 2 biswas of Nautor land at Navni in Chopal tehsil of Shimla district, which had originally been sanctioned in favour of Mina Ram in 1972. Though the Patta had been prepared, it was never signed by the competent authority. After Mina Ram’s death in 1990, his widow Sewati Devi continued in possession and subsequently sought issuance of the Patta. That Patta too was prepared but remained unsigned. After her death in 2012, Shanti, being their sole legal heir and continuing in cultivating possession, approached the authorities for completion of the process.

The revenue authorities, however, rejected her claim relying upon a government clarification dated August 21, 1980, under which land was not to be re-sanctioned in favour of a married daughter where she was among the Class-I legal heirs. Shanti challenged the order before the High Court.

Appearing for the petitioner, Advocate Sunil Chauhan argued that Shanti was not seeking a fresh allotment of Nautor land as a married daughter. She was seeking completion of an allotment already made in favour of her father and subsequently claimed through her mother as their Class-I legal heir. He specifically contended that the Nautor Land Rules nowhere prohibit a married daughter from succeeding to or claiming such land.

Chauhan who specialised in revenue matter further argued that the 1980 clarification was only an administrative instruction and could not override the statutory Nautor Land Rules. According to the petitioner’s case, Rule 8 merely restricts a son or daughter from applying for Nautor land during the lifetime of the father, subject to exceptions; it contains no prohibition against a married daughter after the death of the original allottee.

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The counsel also relied upon Supreme Court judgments, including Kusum Nisha v. State of U.P., Tej Prakash Pathak v. Rajasthan High Court, Sivanandan C.T. v. High Court of Kerala and Dr Rajinder Singh v. State of Punjab, to contend that administrative orders cannot supplant or amend statutory rules.

The High Court accepted the central contention. It held that Rules 7 and 8 of the Nautor Land Rules contain no provision debarring a married daughter, and that the 1980 administrative clarification could not override the statutory framework. The Court also took note of the changed legal position concerning the rights of daughters under the Hindu Succession Act.

Relying on the Supreme Court’s reasoning in Kusum Nisha, the Court observed that treating marriage as a ground to sever a daughter’s legal relationship with her parental family rests on a gender-based stereotype. It noted that marriage by itself neither extinguishes the relationship with the parental family nor establishes that a daughter is no longer entitled to claim through her parents.

The Court consequently quashed the January 1, 2024 order of the revenue authorities and directed them to reconsider Shanti’s application. If she is otherwise found eligible, the authorities have been directed to issue the sanction and Patta in her favour within two months.

The ruling could provide an important precedential basis in future revenue litigation involving married daughters, particularly where their claims are rejected solely on the basis of marital status or on the strength of executive instructions not contained in the governing statutory rules. However, the judgment is specifically concerned with the Nautor Land Rules and the facts of this case; it does not, by itself, declare that every category of parental land must automatically be transferred to a married daughter irrespective of the governing land law, succession rules or eligibility conditions. The central proposition emerging from the judgment is that marital status alone cannot be introduced as a disqualification where the applicable statutory rules do not prescribe such a restriction.