CHENNAI: The Madras HC has held the settlement deeds executed by parents in the name of their children for transferring properties can be cancelled in case they (parents) are not taken care of even if such a condition was not explicitly mentioned in such deeds.
A division bench of Justices SM Subramaniam and K Rajasekar passed the orders recently while dismissing an appeal filed by an octogenarian woman’s daughter-in-law challenging the cancellation of settlement deed and a single judge’s order to share the property along with her four sisters-in-law.
“The law does not require an express condition in the document for maintenance. Instead, it recognises that love and affection serve as the consideration for the transfer and that this implicit condition is enough to invoke the provision in case of neglect,” the bench said in the order.
The appeal was filed by S Mala, whose mother-in-law S Nagalakshmi (deceased) had approached the authorities for cancellation of the settlement deed executed in favour of her son Kesavan who died in the interregnum. Subsequently, the Nagapattinam RDO held inquiries and issued orders to cancel the deed.
Mala had filed a writ petition in the high court. A single judge had directed her to share the property with her four sisters-in-law. Challenging this order, she filed the appeals.