Marriage expenses as maintenance: transfer of jewellery to an unmarried daughter was treated as legal obligation, not taxable gift.

A transfer of gold jewellery by a Hindu mother to her daughter at marriage was treated as a discharge of the parent's maintenance obligation, not as a voluntary transfer without consideration. Reading the Gift-tax Act with the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, the text states that an unmarried daughter's maintenance includes reasonable marriage expenses, and customary obligations may also support that duty. Because the jewellery was given as a reasonable marriage-related provision within that legal obligation, it was not a gratuitous gift and was therefore outside gift-tax.

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Issues: Whether the transfer of 75 sovereigns of gold jewellery by a Hindu mother to her daughter at the time of marriage constituted a gift exigible to gift-tax, or whether it was a discharge of the parent's legal obligation towards the unmarried daughter.

Analysis: Section 2(xii) of the Gift-tax Act, 1958 contemplates a voluntary transfer without consideration. The Court read section 20(3) of the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956 with section 3(b)(ii) thereof, which includes in the concept of maintenance, in the case of an unmarried daughter, the reasonable expenses of and incident to her marriage. On that basis, and also in the light of section 3(a) of the said Act governing customary obligations, the Court held that a parent's duty to maintain an unmarried daughter may extend to meeting reasonable marriage expenses. The gift was found to be a reasonable marriage-related provision and not a gratuitous transfer made outside the scope of that legal obligation.

Conclusion: The transfer was not a taxable gift under the Gift-tax Act and was protected as a discharge of the mother's legal obligation towards her daughter.

Ratio Decidendi: A reasonable transfer by a parent to an unmarried daughter at the time of marriage, made towards marriage expenses and in discharge of the statutory obligation of maintenance, is not a voluntary gift liable to gift-tax.

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