Section 23 Tribunals Must Hear Transferees Before Declaring Property Transfers Void.

Ramji Mishra, a senior citizen, obtained an ex parte order under Section 23 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007, declaring void a gift deed executed in favour of his daughter-in-law, Vaishali Mishra.

The deed recited that he was pleased with her service and expected her to continue providing service and making arrangements for him.

Vaishali challenged the order, asserting that notice had been sent to an address where she did not reside and that she had not been heard. Her application to set aside the ex parte order was rejected as not maintainable. Ramji separately petitioned for enforcement of that order.

The High Court found that the notices had been sent to Ramji’s address, rather than Vaishali’s, and that she had not received notice of the proceedings.

Whether the ex parte order declaring the gift deed void could stand when Vaishali had not been served with notice or given an opportunity to be heard.

Whether the gift deed contained a condition of the kind contemplated by Section 23(1), and whether that condition had been breached so as to permit the Tribunal to avoid the transfer.

Whether the Tribunal had power to set aside its own ex parte order upon sufficient cause being shown.

Section 23(1) of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 permits a transfer of property by a senior citizen to be declared void where the transfer is subject to a condition that the transferee provide the transferor’s basic amenities and basic physical needs, and the transferee refuses or fails to do so.

Whether a deed imposes such a condition is a matter of construing its terms, with surrounding circumstances potentially relevant where the terms are uncertain.

Principles of natural justice require an opportunity to be heard before an order producing adverse civil consequences is made, absent a statutory exclusion of that opportunity.

The Court left for the Tribunal to consider the parties’ cited authorities, including Satish Chandra Gupta v. State of U.P. and others, Urmila Dixit v. Sunil Sharan Dixit, Rajeshwar Prasad Roy v. State of Bihar and others and Kamalakant Mishra v. Collector; it did not decide their application to the merits.

The Tribunal had declared the deed void without hearing Vaishali, despite the notices having been sent to an address where she did not reside. Because the order carried adverse civil consequences and the Act did not exclude a hearing, the ex parte determination could not stand.

The Court did not decide whether the deed’s recitals created a condition within Section 23(1), or whether Vaishali had breached it: those questions required the Tribunal to assess the deed and relevant surrounding circumstances on evidence, after hearing both sides.

The Court also expressly left open whether the Tribunal possessed power to set aside its own ex parte order.

The order dated 29 October 2025 was quashed, and the Section 23 case was restored to the Sub-Divisional Magistrate/Tribunal for a fresh decision in accordance with law, with two effective hearing dates to be fixed each week and the matter decided with utmost dispatch.

The challenge to the order rejecting restoration did not survive once the original order was quashed. Ramji’s connected enforcement petition did not survive and was consigned to the record.