If Nick Reiner Were Indian, Would His Religion Matter? - Why Does India's Slayer Rule Depend on Religion?

A recent story from the United States caught my attention.

Nick Reiner, son of filmmaker Rob Reiner, is reportedly seeking access to trust funds to pay for his legal defence while facing allegations relating to the deaths of his parents.

The criminal case will take its own course. But the succession-law issue buried beneath the headlines is fascinating.

Can a person accused of killing a family member inherit from that very person?

Most people would instinctively answer:

"Of course not."

That instinct finds expression in what lawyers call the "slayer rule" or "slayer statute"—a legal principle that prevents a person from benefiting from the estate of someone whose death they unlawfully caused.

As it turns out, the answer in India is not quite so simple.

In fact, it may depend on the religion of the deceased.

The Principle Everyone Agrees With

Across legal systems, there is a remarkably old and remarkably simple rule:

No person should profit from his own wrongdoing.

A son who murders his father should not inherit the father's estate.

A husband who kills his wife should not walk away with her property.

A beneficiary who causes the death of the testator should not be rewarded for the act.

Lawyers call this the "slayer rule". The principle is rooted not merely in succession law but in a deeper notion of public policy: the law cannot permit a wrongdoer to benefit from the consequences of his wrongdoing.

Few would disagree with it.

Yet India's succession laws treat this supposedly universal principle in a surprisingly uneven manner.

The Hindu Succession Act Has a Clear Answer

Section 25 of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 provides that a person who commits murder or abets the commission of murder is disqualified from inheriting the property of the person murdered.

Section 27 goes even further. It directs that succession should proceed as if the murderer had died before the victim.

The consequence is absolute.

For succession purposes, the wrongdoer is effectively removed from the family tree.

Importantly, the Hindu Succession Act does not apply only to Hindus. It also governs Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs.

For these communities, Parliament answered the question seventy years ago.

Kill the person from whom you seek to inherit, and the law will not permit you to benefit from that death.

The Supreme Court Has Now Gone Further

The recent Supreme Court decision in Manjula v. D.A. Srinivas is particularly noteworthy.

The dispute arose in the context of a Will. One of the arguments advanced before the Court was that Section 25 should apply only to intestate succession and not to testamentary succession.

The Supreme Court rejected that argument.

The Court held that the principle underlying Section 25 is not confined to intestate succession. More importantly, it emphasised that the rule is founded upon broader considerations of justice, equity, public policy and good conscience.

The judgment repeatedly returns to a simple proposition:

A person should not be allowed to profit from his own wrong.

In doing so, the Court treated Section 25 not as the source of the principle, but as a statutory expression of a much older doctrine.

That observation raises an intriguing question.

If the principle is universal, why isn't the legislation?

The Curious Case of Christians and Parsis

This is where things become interesting.

Christians and Parsis are generally governed by the Indian Succession Act, 1925.

One might assume that a principle as fundamental as the slayer rule would appear there as well.

It does not.

The Indian Succession Act contains no equivalent to Sections 25 and 27 of the Hindu Succession Act.

The principle that a murderer should not inherit from the victim is expressly codified for Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs.

It is not expressly codified for Christians and Parsis.

That does not necessarily mean a court would allow a murderer to inherit. Courts may still invoke equitable principles, public policy and the broader doctrine recognised by the Supreme Court.

But the legislative distinction remains.

And it is difficult to explain.

After all, the proposition that a killer should not inherit from the victim is not a matter of theology. It is not uniquely Hindu. It is not uniquely Sikh, Jain or Buddhist.

It is a principle of justice.

Or at least that is what the Supreme Court has now told us.

The Question Nobody Seems To Be Asking

The Nick Reiner case has generated considerable debate in the United States about trusts, inheritance rights and the limits of the slayer rule.

But it also exposes an anomaly much closer to home.

India recognises the principle.

India's highest court has described it as a rule grounded in justice, equity, good conscience and public policy.

Yet Parliament has chosen to codify it only for certain communities.

That leaves us with a question that is both simple and uncomfortable.

If no person should profit from his own wrongdoing, why should that principle depend upon the religion of the deceased?

The Supreme Court's recent judgment may have settled the law for those governed by the Hindu Succession Act.

It has also shone a light on a much larger issue.

Perhaps the real question is no longer whether India recognises the slayer rule.

The real question is why, in a country that aspires to equal treatment under the law, the statutory expression of that rule remains religion-specific.