In Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma [(2020) 9 SCC 1], a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court held that daughters acquire coparcenary rights by birth. Consequently, for a daughter to claim these coparcenary rights, her father need not have been alive when the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005, came into force.
The Court observed: “The conferral of right is by birth, and the rights are given in the same manner with incidents of coparcenary as that of a son and she is treated as a coparcener in the same manner with the same rights as if she had been a son at the time of birth.”
The judgment clarified that the substituted Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956, confers the status of a coparcener on a daughter, regardless of whether she was born before or after the amendment, granting her the same rights and liabilities as a son.
However, these rights can be claimed effective from September 9, 2005. The Section 6(1) of the amended Hindu Succession Act protects any disposition, alienation, partition, or testamentary disposition of property that took place before December 20, 2004.
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