ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan on Saturday issued its written verdict regarding a woman’s right to inheritance.
The apex court termed depriving women of the shariah right of their inheritance an abominable act. “It has become common to deprive women of the inheritance specified by the shariah, which is violation of commandment of Allah (SWT),” read the judgment.
“Depriving female members of a family by their male relatives from their right to inheritance is an abominable act”, the court verdict written by Justice Qazi Faez Isa read. “Depriving women from family inheritance, which is allowed by the Sharia, is violation of the divine law,” according to the judgment.
“It is general tendency to deny the women from their right to inheritance provided by the Sharia law, with fraud and other intrigues,” the apex court bench observed. “This deprivation of family inheritance causes pain to women. Every day the country witnesses male relatives deny their female kinfolk from their inherent right,” the court said.
In September, the Supreme Court in its landmark ruling said that women must claim their right to inheritance in their lifetime. The court had said that the law protected women’s right to inheritance. “If they fail to claim inheritance in their lifetime, their children cannot lay a claim,” a bench of the apex court said in its verdict over the women’s right to inherit.
A bench of the supreme court said that the law protects women’s right to inheritance. “What remains to be decided is what happens if they rescind their right or do not lay a claim over the family inheritance.
The Supreme Court issued the remarks in a case in which the children of two women had claimed their right in property of their maternal grandfather. Isa Khan transferred his properties to his son Abdul Rehman in 1935 and did not give a share in his property to his two daughters.
The sisters never claimed their right to inheritance in their lifetime. Their children has claimed their right to inheritance of their maternal grandfather in 2004. A civil court decided the matter in their favour but the Peshawar High Court (PHC) had quashed the lower court’s decision. The Supreme Court also upheld the high court’s decision in the case.
