Single male cannot form joint Hindu family with wife and unmarried daughter as they lack coparcenary rights

SC held that a single male cannot form a joint Hindu family with wife and unmarried daughter as they are not coparceners. When appellant threw his separate property (Kathoke Lodge) into family hotchpot, it remained his individual property under Hindu law since wife and daughter only had maintenance rights, not ownership rights. They cannot demand partition or restrain alienation. Property would become joint family property only upon birth of a son. Until then, appellant retains full ownership rights and income remains chargeable as his individual income for tax purposes, not family income. Appeal dismissed.

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Issues: (i) Whether a Hindu undivided family could be constituted by a single male member with his wife and unmarried daughter; (ii) whether self-acquired property thrown by the assessee into the family hotchpot, in such a family, generated income assessable as the income of the Hindu undivided family or as the individual income of the assessee.

Issue (i): Whether a Hindu undivided family could be constituted by a single male member with his wife and unmarried daughter.

Analysis: Hindu law recognises a joint family as a body wider than a coparcenary, and the expression "Hindu undivided family" in the Income-tax Act is to be understood in the sense in which it is understood under Hindu law. A Hindu undivided family may consist of a single male member and female members, and the absence of multiple male coparceners is not decisive. The wife and unmarried daughter are members of the family by reason of the tie of sapindaship, though they are not coparceners.

Conclusion: Yes. The assessee, his wife and unmarried daughter could constitute a Hindu undivided family.

Issue (ii): Whether self-acquired property thrown by the assessee into the family hotchpot, in such a family, generated income assessable as the income of the Hindu undivided family or as the individual income of the assessee.

Analysis: The Court distinguished cases where property already belonging to a subsisting joint family comes to a sole surviving coparcener from cases where separate property is first impressed with a family character by the owner. Property put into the common stock in a family consisting only of the assessee, his wife and daughter may acquire a family description, but until the birth or adoption of a son it remains, in the eye of Hindu law, the assessee's property. The wife and daughter have only maintenance rights and no birthright or power to demand partition. Consequently, the income from such property is chargeable as the assessee's own income.

Conclusion: The income was assessable as the individual income of the assessee and not as the income of the Hindu undivided family.

Final Conclusion: The family status was recognised, but the income from Kathoke Lodge remained taxable in the assessee's hands as his separate income, so the revenue's assessment was upheld.

Ratio Decidendi: For income-tax purposes, a Hindu undivided family may consist of a single male member with female members, but property newly impressed with a family character by a sole male owner remains taxable as his individual income until the family acquires a son or other coparcenary incident that changes the legal character of the property.

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