Indian Succession Act • Official Statutory Text & Practice Guide
Statutory Regulation
Legal Standard
Competent Court / Tribunal
Act 1925
Section 23 of Indian Succession Act: Application of Part for Intestate Succession
Official Bare Act Text
Override / Mandate Mens Rea (Intent) Actus Reus (Conduct) Punishment Limitation Monetary
Nothing in this Part shall apply to any will made or intestacy occurring before the first day of January, 1866, or to intestate or testamentary succession to the property of any Hindu, Muhammadan, Buddhist, Sikh, Jaina or Parsi.
Legal Commentary & Landmark Judgments: Section 23
Section 23 sets out the application of Part IV (Consanguinity), declaring that nothing in this Part shall apply to any Hindu, Muhammadan, Buddhist, Sikh, Jaina, or Parsi.
Protected Domestic Relationships & Scope: Section 23 establishes the statutory boundaries of the rules of consanguinity codified in Part IV.
Penal Consequences & Liability: By expressly excluding Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jainas, and Parsis, the section confines the statutory computation of kindred and degrees of relationship under Sections 24 to 28 primarily to Indian Christians, Jews, Anglo-Indians, and persons whose succession is governed by the Special Marriage Act.
For the communities excluded by Section 23, the calculation of kinship and degrees of agnates, cognates, or sapindas is governed by their respective personal laws (such as the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 or uncodified Muslim personal law). However, the mathematical logic of computing generational distance embodied in Part IV remains an authoritative analytical touchstone in comparative Indian family jurisprudence.
Key Landmark Precedents:
Mary Roy v. State of Kerala, (1986) 2 SCC 209: The Supreme Court recognized that Part IV and Part V of the Indian Succession Act establish uniform rules of consanguinity and intestate distribution for Indian Christians, striking down discriminatory regional enactments like the Travancore Christian Succession Act.
G. Kasturi v. Director of Harijan and Tribal Welfare, AIR 1990 Mad 302: The High Court affirmed that Section 23 delineates the statutory boundaries of Part IV, reserving personal law systems while maintaining the civil law method of computing kindred for governed communities.
Legal Commentary:
Section 23 must be carefully checked whenever an intestate succession dispute is filed. If the deceased belonged to an excluded community, applying Part IV rules constitutes a fatal jurisdictional error. Conversely, for Indian Christians and civil marriage celebrants, the rules of consanguinity in Sections 24 to 28 provide the sole lawful mechanism to determine who qualifies as next-of-kin entitled to letters of administration or statutory shares.
Legal Commentary & Landmark Judgments: Section 23
Section 23 sets out the application of Part IV (Consanguinity), declaring that nothing in this Part shall apply to any Hindu, Muhammadan, Buddhist, Sikh, Jaina, or Parsi.
For the communities excluded by Section 23, the calculation of kinship and degrees of agnates, cognates, or sapindas is governed by their respective personal laws (such as the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 or uncodified Muslim personal law). However, the mathematical logic of computing generational distance embodied in Part IV remains an authoritative analytical touchstone in comparative Indian family jurisprudence.
Section 23 must be carefully checked whenever an intestate succession dispute is filed. If the deceased belonged to an excluded community, applying Part IV rules constitutes a fatal jurisdictional error. Conversely, for Indian Christians and civil marriage celebrants, the rules of consanguinity in Sections 24 to 28 provide the sole lawful mechanism to determine who qualifies as next-of-kin entitled to letters of administration or statutory shares.