New Delhi: Adding to a growing body of judicial decisions dismantling the assumption that a daughter ceases to belong to her parental family after marriage, the Supreme Court Tuesday struck down a state policy that excluded married daughters from the legal definition of “family”, describing such exclusion as constitutionally untenable.
The matters of compassionate appointments, service benefits, succession, pensions and compensation—all have led the top court to create a jurisprudence recognising that dependency and familial ties do not end with marriage.
In the latest decision, the top court bench of Justices P.S. Narasimha and Alok Aradhe reversed Allahabad High Court orders—and ruled that a married daughter cannot be excluded from the definition of “family” for welfare benefits or allotment of a fair price shop dealership on compassionate grounds.
The case centred on the denial of a compassionate appointment to a married daughter, Nisha, following the death of her mother, who was a fair price shop dealer.
Despite being the sole earning member responsible for her four sisters, including one who is visually impaired, Nisha’s application for the allotment of the shop was rejected, on the sole ground that as a married daughter, she did not fall within the definition of “family” prescribed by UP’s 2019 Government Order, which explicitly limited the term to “unmarried, legally separated, or widowed daughters”.
The Supreme Court held that excluding married daughters from the definition of “family” was constitutionally unsustainable as it violated the guarantees of equality under Articles 14 and 15(1) of the Constitution.
The court observed that the primary object of the dependent quota is to provide “immediate succour to the family of a deceased dealer facing financial hardship”, and noted that “marital status bears no rational nexus” to considerations like dependency or financial need.
It also emphasised that the scheme does not exclude a married son from consideration—who continues to remain within the fold of the family irrespective of his marital status, whereas a daughter is excluded solely because she is married.
“The distinction is founded upon a gender-based stereotype that a daughter, upon marriage, becomes a member of another family and loses all ties with her natal family,” the bench noted.
“Marriage neither extinguishes the bond between a daughter and her parental family nor furnishes a valid basis to presume absence of dependency,” said the court.
Applying the doctrine of purposive construction, the court ruled that the words “unmarried, legally separated and widowed daughters” in the relevant regulation must be read to include married daughters, provided they satisfy other eligibility criteria such as residency and proof of dependency.
Consequently, the Supreme Court quashed the orders rejecting Nisha’s claim and directed the competent authority to issue the shop allotment order in her favour within four weeks.
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‘Once a daughter, always a daughter’
Prior to the 2005 amendment to Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, daughters could inherit only their father’s share after his death but could not seek partition of ancestral property. However, post amendment, daughters were given equal coparcenary rights—the right acquired by birth allowing a person to inherit ancestral property and demand partition.
In the 2015 judgement in Prakash vs Phulavati, a two-judge bench of the SC held that if the coparcener (father) had passed away prior to 9 September, 2005, (date on which the amendment came into effect), his daughter would have no coparcenary right.
However, in Danamma vs Amar in 2018, another two-judge bench held that the two daughters in this matter would get a share in the property, even if their father had passed away in 2001.
The conflicting two judge-bench decisions led to a three judge-bench order by Justices Arun Mishra, S. Abdul Nazeer and M.R. Shah, which held in August 2020 that Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act gives an “unobstructed heritage” (coparcenary right by birth) to the daughter, irrespective of whether the father was alive on 9 September, 2005.
In this landmark case, Justice Mishra said: “Once a daughter, always a daughter. A son is a son till he is married. The daughter shall remain a coparcener throughout life, irrespective of whether her father is alive or not.”
In this Vineeta Sharma vs Rakesh Sharma case, the top court was dealing with a succession dispute but its reasoning was on the challenge to the notion that marriage transfers a woman entirely into her husband’s family.
Before the Supreme Court’s Tuesday ruling, several high courts had already begun reading “family” in this inclusive manner—the Bombay, Karnataka and Calcutta HCs have held that married daughters cannot be denied compassionate appointment solely because of marriage.
Even though this has been affirmed consistently, the SC in a 2025 judgement also noted that compassionate appointments are not vested rights or heritable property, but narrowly tailored welfare measures intended to provide immediate financial succour to families facing sudden penury due to an employee’s death.
The central principle emerging from these cases is that compassionate appointment—government’s social security scheme that allows a dependent family member to secure a job when a primary breadwinner dies while in service or is forced to retire on medical grounds—is a welfare measure intended to relieve financial hardship.
The courts have noted that since the purpose is of economic support rather than the family structure preservation, a woman’s marital status cannot become a disqualifying criterion.
Property rights and pension rights
Repeated interventions by the top court in land acquisition and inheritance disputes, where married daughters were denied compensation or share on the assumption that they no longer belonged to the natal family, have also created jurisprudence.
In the case of Arunachala Gounder vs Ponnusamy (2022), the top court strengthened the recognition of daughters’ inheritance rights, declaring that if a male Hindu dies intestate, his daughters are entitled to inherit even his self-acquired property, taking priority over other collateral heirs like brothers’ children.
The broader constitutional trend highlighted is that economic entitlements flowing from family relationships cannot be denied because of a woman’s marital status solely. The court’s approach has been to treat married daughters as continuing members of the parental lineage for purposes of succession and property rights.
In a 2016 Supreme Court judgement (Philomina K.A. vs District Collector Alappuzha), Justice A.K. Sikri ruled that an unmarried daughter of a freedom fighter remained eligible for dependent pension under the Kerala Freedom Fighters’ Pension Rules, 1971, even if she had a son born out of an extramarital relationship.
Under Rule 10 of the 1971 Rules, dependent pensions are eligible to continue to unmarried daughters as long as they have not “otherwise become independent” of the freedom fighter.
The court observed that the HC had erred in denying the daughter pension. The state authorities had rejected her claim on the grounds that she had a 25-year-old son from an extramarital relationship, ignoring the fact that he was married and living independently, and she herself had no income.
Because the daughter was unmarried, had no income of her own, and had to reside with her nephew after the death of her parents, the court affirmed that she never became financially independent of her father.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)