Dismissed¶16

Dwarika v. Sushil Bai @ Sushila

Chhattisgarh HC24 Aug 2025SA/10/2021

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

Chhattisgarh HC Bilaspur; SA No. 10 of 2021; Naresh Kumar Chandravanshi, J.; judgment 25/08/2025 (NAFR). Daughter's equal coparcenary share (1/7th) in ancestral property of Makhan Verma upheld under Section 8, Hindu Succession Act 1956, substantial question under Section 6(i) as amended in 2005 answered in her favour; Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma (2020) 9 SCC 1 and Prasanta Kumar Sahoo v. Charulata Sahoo 2023(9) SCC 6 relied upon; concurrent findings; second appeal dismissed.

What did the court decide?

None to the appellants; the concurrent decrees entitling the plaintiff to a 1/7th share in the Schedule-A suit property stand upheld; parties to bear their own costs; decree to be drawn up accordingly; pending IA(s), if any, disposed of. ¶16

Dwarika Vs Sushil Bai @ Sushila — Succession and Inheritance | Chhattisgarh HC (2025)

What the court decided

AI extract

Outcome

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Issue for consideration

Whether the First Appellate Court is justified in granting partition to the plaintiff ignoring the provisions of Section 6 (i) of the Hindu Succession Act as amended in the year 2005?

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Court's answer

The suit property was owned by Late Makhan Verma, obtained from his ancestors; the plaintiff and defendants, being his seven sons and daughters, all have coparcenary right over the suit property, and each is entitled to a 1/7th share as per Section 8 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956.

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Ratio / Principle

There is no infirmity or illegality in the trial court and first appellate court granting the plaintiff her 1/7th share; the finding recorded by the trial court and upheld by the first appellate court deserves to be upheld.

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Key takeaways

The substantial question of law is answered in favour of respondent No.1/plaintiff and against the appellant/defendants.ratio¶15

Detailed headnote1 paragraphs

Second Appeal (S.100 CPC) against concurrent decrees — Civil Judge Class I, Bemetara (09.5.2018, civil suit No. A/6200034/14), affirmed by Additional District Judge, Bemetara (26.11.2020, civil appeal No.67A/2018) — awarding the plaintiff, a daughter of Late Makhan Verma, a 1/7th share in ancestral suit property. Substantial question: whether the first appellate court was justified in granting partition ignoring Section 6(i) of the Hindu Succession Act as amended in 2005. Held, dismissing the appeal: the property was obtained by Makhan Verma from his ancestors; his seven children — sons and daughters alike — are coparceners, each entitled to 1/7th share under Section 8, Hindu Succession Act, 1956; relying on Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma, (2020) 9 SCC 1 (daughters have coparcenary status equal to sons, the right accruing by birth; per the quoted precedent, an oral-partition plea is not acceptable absent a registered deed or court decree, save exceptional public-document cases), as further followed in Prasanta Kumar Sahoo v. Charulata Sahoo, 2023(9) SCC 6. Substantial question answered in favour of the plaintiff; concurrent findings upheld; parties to bear their own costs.

2025:CGHC:42929

NAFR

HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR

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SA No. 10 of 2021

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1. Dwarika S/o Makhan Verma Aged About 63 Years

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2. Khemram S/o Makhan Verma Aged About 59 Years (wrongly mentioned as Hemram in appellate Court order)

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3. Malikram S/o Makhan Aged About 38 Years

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All are R/o Village Katai, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh ... Appellants(Defendants No.1, 2 & 3)

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versus

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1. Sushil Bai @ Sushila W/o Harnarayan @ Kamalnarayan Verma Aged About 45 Years R/o Village Katai, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh ( Plaintiff )

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2. Khemin Bai W/o Late Ramlal Verma Aged About 64 Years R/o Village Katai, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh .....( Defendant No. 4 ) 3. Munnibai @ Shyamkali W/o Rajendra Verma Aged About 50 Years R/o Village Buchipur, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh. ( DefendantNo.5 )

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4. Kaushilya W/o Devi Verma Aged About 48 Years R/o Village Nagdha, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh ( Defendant No. 6 )

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5. Hemant S/o Dwarika Verma Aged About 30 Years( Defendant No.7 )

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6. Laxman S/o Khemram Verma Aged About 26 Years ( Defendant No.8 ) .

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7. Birendra S/o Malikram Verma Aged About 22 Years ( Defendant No. 9 ) All R/o Village Katai, Tehsil Navaragh, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh

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8. State Of Chhattisgarh Through The Collector, District- Bemetara, Chhattisgarh, District : Bemetara, Chhattisgarh

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		... Respondents
For Appellant	:	Mr. Gyan Prakash Shukla, Advocate
For Respondent No.1	:	Mr. Hemant Gupta, Advocate
For Respondent No.2, 3 & 4	:	None, though served
For Respondents No. 5, 6 &7	:	Mr. Divyanand Patel, Advocate on
		behalf of Mr. H.S. Patel, Advocate
For Respondent No.8/ State	:	Mr. Amandeep Singh, PL

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(Hon’ble Shri Justice Naresh Kumar Chandravanshi)

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Judgment on Board

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25/08/2025

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The appellants/defendants have preferred this Second Appeal under Section 100 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (for short ‘the CPC’) against judgment and decree dated 26.11.2020 passed by the Additional District Judge, Bemetara, District Bemetara (C.G.) in civil appeal No.67A/2018 upholding the judgment and decree dated 09.5.2018 passed by the Civil Judge, Class I, Bemetara (C.G.) in civil suit No. A/6200034/14, whereby the learned trial Court allowed civil suit filed by plaintiff/respondent No.1 herein for declaration of her title/ partition and possession and entitled her to get 1/7^th share of suit property mentioned in Schedule A.

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[For the sake of convenience, the parties would be referred to as per their status and ranking given in the plaint].

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Facts of the case, in brief, are that both the party are members of same family. Their family tree, as mentioned in plaint, is as under:

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As per pleading of the plaintiff, the suit land is an ancestral property of plaintiff and defendants. Both the parties are brothers and sisters, therefore, plaintiff has coparcenary right over the suit property. It has further been averred that despite of requests made by plaintiff, her share was not given by defendants for which she filed civil suit for declaration of her title, possession and partition for grant of her 1/7^th share.

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Defendants No.1 to 9 filed their written statement, in which, they did not controvert the relationship between the parties and averred that all the property of Makhan Verma had not been included by plaintiff in suit property and defendants have already given share to plaintiff by purchasing a piece of land in the name of her husband Kamal Narayan @ Harnarayan to which sale consideration was paid by defendants. Further, the mutation of the suit property was well within the knowledge of plaintiff since 1997 and, as such, the suit is directly hit by limitation. Therefore, plaintiff is not entitled to get any more share of the suit

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property.

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On the basis of pleadings of both the parties, learned trial Court framed as many as 5 issues, recorded evidence adduced by both the parties and after considering the same, allowed civil suit filed by plaintiff by entitling her to get 1/7^th share of suit property after getting partition of the same.

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Against the said judgment and decree of the trial Court, the defendants No.1 to 3 preferred appeal before the learned first Appellate Court and the learned first Appellate Court upheld the judgment and decree passed by the learned trial Court in favour of the plaintiff vide its judgment and decree dated 26.11.2020. Hence, this second appeal has been preferred by defendants/ appellants herein.

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Learned counsel for the defendants/ appellants submits that against share of plaintiff, defendants have given cash amount to her husband for purchasing a piece of land. He further submits that in lieu thereof, plaintiff had relinquished her share over the suit property, therefore, plaintiff is not entitled at all to claim her share over it.

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Per contra, learned counsel for plaintiff No.1/ respondent No.1 submits that defendants have utterly failed to prove the fact that while purchasing the said piece of land by husband of plaintiff, they had given any amount to him and even no relinquishment deed has been filed / proved, allegedly executed by plaintiff in favour of defendants. He next submits that suit property is an ancestral property of plaintiff and defendants and both the parties are brothers and sisters, therefore, plaintiff has coparcenary right over it in view of the judgment rendered by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, in the matter of Vineeta Sharma vs. Rakesh Sharma reported in [(2020) 9 SCC 1]. He also submits that

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suit property was received by Makhan Verma from his father and Makhan Verma has 7 children (3 sons and 4 daughters), therefore, learned trial Court as well as learned first Appellate Court have not committed any error or mistake in granting 1/7^th share of suit property to the plaintiff, of which, she is entitled as per Section 8 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956, hence, the instant second appeal is liable to be rejected.

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Learned counsel for respondents No. 5, 6 and 7 extended his support to the contention made by learned counsel for defendants/appellants.

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10.I have heard learned counsel for the parties; considered their rival submissions made herein-above and perused the record of trial Court as well as first Appellate Court with utmost circumspection.

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This second appeal has been admitted for hearing on the following substantial question of law:-

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“Whether the First Appellate Court is justified in granting partition to the plaintiff ignoring the provisions of Section 6 (i) of the Hindu Succession Act as amended in the year 2005?”

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12.Undisputedly, suit property was owned by Late Makhan Verma, which he obtained from his ancestors. Plaintiff and defendants are brothers and sisters, total 7 in number, as such, being sons and daughters of Late Makhan Verma, all 7 children have coparcenary right over the suit property, and each of them is entitled to get 1/ 7^th share of the suit property as per Section 8 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956.

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In the matter of Vineeta Sharma (Supra), the Hon’ble Supreme Court has settled the law that daughters are also entitled to equal share over

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the ancestral property as the sons are entitled. In para 137 of the judgment, it has been held that :-

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“137. Resultantly, we answer the reference

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as under:

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137.1. The provisions contained in substituted Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 confer status of coparcener on the daughter born before or after the amendment in the same manner as son with same rights and liabilities.

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137.2. The rights can be claimed by the daughter born earlier with effect from 9-9-2005 with savings as provided in Section 6(1) as to the disposition or alienation, partition or testamentary disposition which had taken place before the 20th day of December, 2004.

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137.3. Since the right in coparcenary is by birth, it is not necessary that father coparcener should be living as on 9-9-2005.

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137.4. The statutory fiction of partition created by the proviso to Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 as originally enacted did not bring about the actual partition or disruption of coparcenary. The fiction was only for the purpose of ascertaining share of deceased coparcener when he was survived by a female heir, of Class I as specified in the Schedule to the 1956 Act or male relative of such female. The provisions of the substituted Section 6 are required to be given full effect. Notwithstanding that a preliminary decree has been passed, the daughters are to be given share in coparcenary equal to that of a son in pending proceedings for final decree or in an appeal.

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137.5. In view of the rigour of provisions of the Explanation to Section 6(5) of the 1956 Act, a plea of oral partition cannot be accepted as the statutory recognised mode of partition effected by a deed of partition duly registered under the provisions of the Registration Act, 1908 or effected by a decree of a court. However, in exceptional cases where plea of oral partition is supported by public documents and partition is finally evinced in the same manner as if it had been affected ( sic effected) by a decree of a court, it may be accepted. A plea of partition based on oral evidence alone cannot be accepted and to be rejected outrightly.”

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14.The dictum given in the case of Vineeta Sharma (supra) has further been followed in the case of Prasanta Kumar Sahoo vs.

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Charulata Sahoo [2023(9) SCC 6] .

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15.Coming to the facts of the present case, in light of principles of law laid down by their Lordships of the Supreme Court, in the above stated judgments, it is quite apparent that plaintiff and defendants are the sons and daughters of Late Makhan Verma, who obtained the suit property from his ancestors, and the plaintiff has the coparcenary right over the suit property. Since plaintiff is having coparcenary right over the suit property and plaintiff and defendants are total 7 brothers and sisters, I do not find any infirmity or illegality in granting 1/ 7^th share to the plaintiff in suit property by the trial Court as well as first Appellate Court, hence, finding recorded by trial Court and upheld by first Appellate Court deserves to be upheld. Accordingly, question of law is answered in favour of respondent No.1/ plaintiff and against the appellant/ defendants.

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