Under amended Section 6, daughters acquire coparcenary rights by birth, regardless of whether their father was alive on 9 September 2005.

The plaintiffs sought a declaration that they and the defendants were joint owners in possession of the suit land in equal shares, and that Mutation Nos. 69 and 115, sanctioned in favour of defendant No. 1, were illegal and non-binding. They also sought a permanent injunction against their dispossession.

The defendants asserted that the property was ancestral coparcenary property and that a partition had taken place in 1985, under which different portions were allotted to the parties. They relied upon earlier litigation instituted by Kartar Chand, the predecessor-in-interest, and contended that the present suit was barred by res judicata.

The Trial Court held that the earlier litigation did not determine the parties’ precise shares and partly decreed the suit by declaring the parties’ respective inheritance shares.

The First Appellate Court reversed the decree, holding that the alleged partition had not been proved, that the plaintiffs were not entitled to an injunction because defendant No. 1 was in possession, and that the revenue mutations had been sanctioned without considering the appellate judgment in the earlier proceedings.

Defendant No. 1 preferred the present second appeal, which was admitted on three substantial questions of law.

1. Whether the earlier adjudication regarding partition and the nature of the suit property operated as res judicata in the subsequent suit.

2. Whether the earlier judgments conclusively established that Kartar Chand was the Karta of a joint Hindu family consisting of himself and his two sons, thereby precluding contrary findings in the present proceedings.

3. Whether daughters born before 9 September 2005 acquired coparcenary rights under the substituted Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956, or whether the 2005 amendment operated only prospectively.

The Court applied the doctrine of res judicata, holding that an issue directly and substantially decided between the same parties in earlier litigation cannot be reopened in subsequent proceedings.

It also applied the substituted Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956, as amended in 2005, under which a daughter becomes a coparcener by birth, with the same rights and liabilities as a son.

Relying on Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma, (2020) 9 SCC 1, the Court held that the daughter’s coparcenary right is not dependent upon the father being alive on 9 September 2005; however, rights of daughters born before that date operate from 9 September 2005, subject to the statutory savings relating to prior dispositions, alienations, partitions or testamentary dispositions.

The Court examined the earlier judgment of the District Judge dated 8 December 1994, which had rejected the alleged compromise as an unregistered and invalid partition deed and had held that defendant No. 1 was in possession, without granting the plaintiff possession.

Consequently, defendant No. 1 was barred by res judicata from again asserting in the present proceedings that a valid partition had taken place and that he had been allotted a one-third share.

At the same time, the earlier findings that the property was joint Hindu coparcenary property were not disturbed by either court below. The First Appellate Court’s conclusion that the precise shares need not be determined in the injunction/declaration proceedings was therefore not contrary to the earlier adjudication.

On the succession issue, the Court applied Vineeta Sharma and rejected the appellant’s contention that daughters born before the 2005 amendment were excluded from coparcenary rights. Such daughters acquired coparcenary status by birth, subject to the statutory protection of transactions completed before the relevant cut-off dates.

It answered the third question by holding that daughters born before 9 September 2005 were also entitled to coparcenary rights under amended Section 6 of the Hindu Succession Act, subject to statutory savings.

Finding no infirmity in the First Appellate Court’s judgment and decree, the High Court dismissed the second appeal and directed that the pending applications, if any, also stood disposed of.