Almost everything in Indian law works one way. A registered transfer is final, a gift once made is gone, and a parent who has already signed is told there is nothing to be done. This Act is the exception. Under Section 23 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007, property transferred on the condition that you would be looked after can be declared void when that condition is broken — and in January 2025 the Supreme Court confirmed that the same Tribunal can order eviction and put you back in possession. It is not a court. It is a Sub-Divisional Magistrate, the Act gives it ninety days, and this page is about how it actually works — including the parts that are commonly got wrong.
Parents arrive with one sentence — “my son does not look after me” — and inside it are two completely different claims. It is worth separating them on the first day, because they are not equally well served by the same forum.
| A monthly amount | The property back | |
|---|---|---|
| What you are asking | Maintenance so you can live | That a transfer you made be undone |
| Where | Maintenance Tribunal, or a Magistrate under the other route | Only the Maintenance Tribunal — nowhere else has this power |
| The catch | A ceiling written into this Act — see below | There has to have been a condition, and it has to be provable |
| Speed | The Act directs ninety days | The same proceeding, same direction |
| Do you need an advocate? | Often manageable alone | Engage one. This turns on judgments |
This Act can undo a completed, registered transfer when the promise to look after you was broken — nothing else in Indian law does that. The forum is a Sub-Divisional Magistrate, not a court, and the Act gives it ninety days. But the monthly allowance it can order is capped by the Act, so if money is the need, the other route matters. And two things almost every article gets wrong: you may bring a lawyer in Delhi, and a daughter-in-law’s right of residence is neither absolute nor nothing.
Read what it actually does, because it is unusual enough that people assume it cannot be right.
Where a senior citizen has, after the commencement of the Act, transferred property by way of gift or otherwise, subject to the condition that the transferee shall provide the basic amenities and basic physical needs to the transferor, and the transferee refuses or fails to provide them, that transfer shall be deemed to have been made by fraud or coercion or under undue influence, and shall, at the option of the transferor, be declared void by the Tribunal.
Three things in that sentence do a great deal of work. The transfer is deemed to have been made by fraud — you do not have to prove fraud in the ordinary way, which would be nearly impossible against your own child. It is void at your option — it is your choice whether to exercise it, and nobody else can force the issue. And it is the Tribunal that declares it, not a civil court after a decade of trial.
Two questions had divided High Courts for years, and Urmila Dixit v. Sunil Sharan Dixit, decided on 2 January 2025, answered both.
First: how strictly is the condition to be read? Liberally. The Court held that welfare legislation of this kind is to be construed so as to give effect to its object, that interpreting it strictly defeats that purpose, and that the Tribunal should consider collateral documents and the factual circumstances rather than only the strict language of the deed. In that case a separate promissory note recording the undertaking to look after the parent, coupled with evidence of a broken relationship and neglect, satisfied the two conditions the section requires.
Second: can the Tribunal do anything beyond cancelling the paper? Yes. The Court held that Tribunals under the Act have jurisdiction to order eviction and possession where that is necessary, and can restore possession when a gift is declared void. The reasoning is obvious once stated: declaring a gift void achieves nothing at all if the person simply continues to live there and the parent has to start again in a civil court.
If you were advised before 2025 that the Tribunal could only cancel the deed and that you would then need a separate suit for possession, that advice has been overtaken. It is worth going back to whoever gave it.
The commonest way one of these applications fails is that the deed says nothing and nothing else was kept. So this section is about what to look for before you conclude you have no case.
And one honest caution. “He does not visit” and “he does not speak to me” are painful, and they are not the same as a failure to provide basic amenities and basic physical needs. A Tribunal is looking for the second. Say the first if it is true, but build the application on the second.
Families argue about this endlessly in general terms. The Act defines it, and the definition is narrower and more practical than the argument usually is.
“Maintenance” under the Act means provision for food, clothing, residence, and medical attendance and treatment. That is the list. And “welfare” is defined separately and more broadly, as provision for food, health care, recreation centres and other amenities necessary for senior citizens.
So when Section 23 speaks of the basic amenities and basic physical needs of the transferor, it is pointing at that first list. This matters in both directions when an application is drafted:
| What people write | What the Tribunal is looking for |
|---|---|
| “He does not respect me” | Whether food, clothing, residence and medical treatment were provided |
| “He never visits” | Dated instances when something on that list was withheld |
| “He took the property and forgot me” | The condition, and then the failure — both limbs, separately |
| “My daughter-in-law is rude to me” | Whether you were kept out of your own residence, or denied medicines or food |
None of this means the hurt does not count. Say it. But build the application on the list, because that is what the section operates on and that is what can be proved.
Four definitions in the Act settle most of the arguments about who can bring a proceeding and against whom, and they are wider than people assume.
Two consequences worth stating plainly. A childless senior citizen whose nephew lives in his house, or would inherit it, is squarely within this Act — and a great many such people have been told they have no remedy. And a grandparent whose grandson is the one in occupation is not outside it either.
This proceeding does not go before a judge. The Maintenance Tribunal is presided over by an officer not below the rank of Sub-Divisional Officer — in Delhi, the Sub-Divisional Magistrate. The Appellate Tribunal is presided over by an officer not below the rank of District Magistrate.
That was a deliberate design. The whole structure was meant to be quick, cheap and informal, because the people it serves are old, often unwell, frequently short of money, and in many cases dependent on the very person they are complaining about. A proceeding that takes eight years is no remedy at all for a person of eighty.
| This Tribunal | An ordinary civil court | |
|---|---|---|
| Who decides | A Sub-Divisional Magistrate | A judge |
| Time the law directs | Ninety days from service of notice, extendable once by thirty | No such direction |
| Procedure | Summary | Full trial, pleadings, evidence, arguments |
| Who may apply | You, anyone you authorise, an organisation — or the Tribunal on its own motion | The plaintiff |
| Can undo a registered gift | Yes, under Section 23 | Only on the ordinary grounds, and slowly |
| Appeal | Appellate Tribunal, sixty days | The ordinary appellate hierarchy |
The ninety days is what the statute directs. It is not a promise about your particular file, and we are not going to pretend it is. But it is a far shorter period than a suit about the same property would take, and it is worth putting the section in your application so that the direction is in front of the Tribunal.
A senior citizen, including a parent, who is unable to maintain himself from his own earnings or from property he owns, may apply for maintenance so that he may lead a normal life. The obligation runs against children, and where the senior citizen is childless, against a relative who is in possession of his property or who would inherit it.
That last limb is missed constantly. A childless senior citizen whose nephew is living in his house and would inherit it is not outside this Act.
And on who may set it in motion: the application may be made by the senior citizen or parent themselves, by any other person or registered organisation authorised by them, and the Tribunal may take cognizance on its own motion. If you are a neighbour, a relative or a social worker reading this on behalf of somebody who cannot come, you are not powerless and you do not need a perfectly drafted petition to start.
This is the single most repeated piece of out-of-date advice on the subject, and it comes from reading the bare section.
Section 17 says that notwithstanding anything contained in any law, no party to a proceeding before a Tribunal or Appellate Tribunal shall be represented by a legal practitioner. Taken by itself, that is plain enough, and it was written to stop proceedings meant to be simple from turning into litigation.
But in Pawan Reley v. Union of India (2022) a Division Bench of the Delhi High Court held that Section 17 would not come in the way of legal representation before the Maintenance Tribunal. The reasoning turned on Section 30 of the Advocates Act, 1961 — which gives advocates the right to practise before courts and tribunals — having been brought into force after the 2007 Act, so it is not caught by the “notwithstanding anything contained in any law” clause, which looks to laws existing when the Act took effect.
So in Delhi you are not obliged to appear alone. Confirm the position with the advocate you engage, because this is a point that moves, but do not walk in believing a door is shut that is not.
Now the part that is less welcome, and that you should know before you choose this forum for the money rather than for the property.
Section 9(2) provides that the maximum maintenance allowance which may be ordered by the Tribunal shall be such as may be prescribed by the State Government, which shall not exceed ten thousand rupees per month. That is a ceiling in the Act itself. What the State actually prescribes within that ceiling is a separate figure, set by order, and it changes — so this page does not print it. Ask at the Tribunal or ask your advocate for the current figure.
What follows from that. If what you need is a monthly amount larger than that ceiling — because of medical costs, rent, or the standard of living you are entitled to — this Act is not the route for the money. It may still be exactly the right route for the property, and the two can be thought about separately.
Parents can also claim maintenance under Section 144 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, before a Magistrate, and there is no such statutory ceiling there. How that route works — who can claim, what has to be shown, interim maintenance, from what date, and enforcement — is set out on our maintenance under Section 144 page and is deliberately not repeated here.
| Senior Citizens Act | Section 144 BNSS | |
|---|---|---|
| Forum | Sub-Divisional Magistrate, as Tribunal | Magistrate |
| Ceiling on the amount | Yes — capped by the Act | No |
| Can undo a property transfer | Yes — Section 23 | No |
| Can order eviction or possession | Yes, after Urmila Dixit | No |
| Time the law directs | Ninety days | Its own scheme — see that page |
| Best when | The property is the issue, or speed is | The amount is the issue |
Using both is not automatically barred, but it should be a decision rather than an enthusiasm. Two proceedings mean two sets of dates and two versions of your evidence, and anything said in one can be produced in the other. Settle with an advocate what each is for before either is filed. We prepare the maintenance petition and the applications to those instructions.
This is the part of the subject where slogans do the most damage, in both directions, so it is set out carefully and it does not take a side.
In S. Vanitha v. Deputy Commissioner, Bengaluru Urban District (2021) the Supreme Court held that the summary eviction procedure under the Senior Citizens Act cannot be used to defeat a woman’s right of residence in a shared household under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act. Both sets of legislation, the Court said, have to be harmoniously construed, and the right to a residence order cannot be defeated by the simple expedient of obtaining an eviction order through the summary procedure. Where there are competing claims under the two statutes, the Tribunal should mould the relief after noticing both.
That is not the end of it, and the other half is equally real. In Pooja Mehta v. State (NCT of Delhi) (2024) the Delhi High Court held that the daughter-in-law’s right under the Domestic Violence Act did not supersede the senior citizen’s right where there was evidence of gross ill-treatment. The Court balanced the two rather than choosing between them: it directed the son to pay a monthly sum so that alternative accommodation could be taken, required the premises to be vacated within a month of the first payment with possession handed to the mother, and expressly preserved the daughter-in-law’s right to seek maintenance separately.
An appeal lies to the Appellate Tribunal, presided over by an officer not below the rank of District Magistrate, within sixty days from the date of the order. A late appeal may be entertained where the Appellate Tribunal is satisfied that the appellant was prevented by sufficient cause from filing in time.
Two practical points. Sixty days is short for a household in distress, so write the date on the order the day you receive it and count from there rather than from when you decided to act. And “sufficient cause” has to be made out with a dated account — illness, admission to hospital, being kept from the papers — not asserted in a line. We prepare the appeal papers to your advocate’s instructions.
An order that is ignored is not the end of the matter and should not be treated as one. The Act provides machinery for recovering the allowance ordered, and the way to use it is to go back to the Tribunal in writing with the dates and the figures.
Which means the arithmetic has to be yours. Keep a single sheet: what was ordered, from what date, what was actually received, on which date, and by what mode. A bank statement with the credits marked is worth more than any amount of explanation. Where the order concerns possession rather than money, an execution application is the route, and it is a separate step that somebody has to take — it does not happen by itself.
Almost everybody who reaches Section 23 got there the same way: they signed a gift deed that said nothing about being looked after, because asking for it in writing felt like an insult to their own child.
So this section is the useful one, and it is written for the parent who has not signed yet. If somebody in your family is being asked to transfer property, read this before the appointment at the sub-registrar, not after.
| What you sign | When it takes effect | Can you change your mind? | Risk to you |
|---|---|---|---|
| Will | Only on your death | Yes — revoke or alter any time while of sound mind | Lowest. You stay the owner of your home |
| Gift deed | Immediately | No, in the ordinary course | Highest — unless the maintenance condition is recited |
| Relinquishment deed | Immediately | No | High — and only usable in favour of an existing co-owner |
| Family settlement | As the document provides | Depends entirely on what it says | Depends — and on whether it needed registration |
And if there is pressure — if the transfer is being asked for urgently, or you are being taken to a registrar without understanding what is being signed, or the paper is in a language you do not read — stop. That is the moment to get a title check and independent advice, not the moment to keep the peace.
Do not conclude it is finished, and do not conclude it is easy either.
Get a certified copy of the registered deed so that you know exactly what was executed and on what date. Then look for the second document — the one signed alongside it. In a great many families there is a note, an undertaking or a letter that nobody thought mattered, and after Urmila Dixit it may matter a great deal.
Where a transfer needs to be formally undone by agreement rather than by fighting — because the family has come to its senses — a cancellation deed executed by both sides is the clean route, and it is far cheaper than a proceeding. That conversation is worth having before the application is filed, because it is much harder to have afterwards.
The Act treats abandonment of a senior citizen by a person having the care or protection of them as an offence, not as a domestic disappointment. Being left at a hospital, a railway station, a temple or a relative’s house and not collected is not something to be negotiated over the following weeks.
If that has happened, or is being threatened, report it. Where a police station will not record anything, our guide to getting a complaint registered sets out the three doors the law provides and the proof each one needs. We prepare complaints to your instructions.
The same applies to threats, to being locked out of your own home, and to being denied food or medicine. Those are not maintenance questions. They are immediate ones, and the paper can follow the same day.
Most of these matters involve several children, and the arithmetic of who pays is where a family that was only half-broken finishes the job.
The obligation runs against children generally, not only against the one who is present or the one who has the property. So the first drafting decision is whether all of them are before the Tribunal. Naming only the child you are angry with is understandable and it is usually a mistake — it invites the reply that others were providing, and it leaves the order narrower than it needed to be.
One warning for parents, given honestly: an application that is really one sibling’s quarrel run through a parent tends to be visible, and it damages the parent’s own case. If that is the shape of your family’s dispute, the property claim under Section 23 and the sibling dispute should be kept apart — the second belongs on our family property disputes page, not in this proceeding.
A growing share of the people this Act was written for have no dispute with anybody. They simply live alone, often with children abroad, and the risk to them is not neglect but exposure — to a tenant, a caretaker, a domestic helper, a relative who visits with papers, or a stranger at the door.
And the single most useful one: do not transfer property because you are afraid of dying intestate. A will answers that fear completely, costs a fraction of the fight, and leaves you the owner of your home tomorrow morning.
A question that comes up constantly, and the answer is not the one families expect.
The remedy under Section 23 is exercisable at the option of the transferor — the senior citizen themselves. It is personal to them, and it is meant to be, because the whole point is that the older person decides whether to undo what they did. A proceeding that was never started in the parent’s lifetime is not simply inherited by the other children as a ready-made claim, and anybody promising otherwise should be asked to explain on what basis.
What the other children may have instead is an entirely different set of questions — whether the transfer was validly executed at all, whether the parent understood it, whether there was undue influence in the ordinary sense, and what the succession position is. Those are civil claims with their own limitation periods, and they are set out on our family property disputes page.
The practical lesson runs the other way. If you are the senior citizen and you intend to exercise this right, exercise it. Waiting for the family to come round is the most common reason this remedy is never used by the one person who clearly had it.
Financial control is usually the first stage, and it leaves the clearest record, which makes it the easiest thing to act on early — if anybody acts.
Two honest notes. Your own bank is often more helpful than people expect when the request is in writing and specific. And if the person controlling the money is the one you would normally ask for help with a letter, that is exactly the situation the legal services desk at the court complex exists for.
Distance does not cancel the obligation, but it changes what is practical, and it is better to know that at the first meeting than at the third hearing.
A proceeding can be pursued against a person outside India; service and enforcement simply become slower and more technical. What usually matters more is what they hold here — whether they own property in India, receive rent or income here, or have an account here. That is frequently where a maintenance order becomes real.
It also cuts the other way, and the page should say so. A child abroad who is sending money regularly, and can show the transfers, is in a strong position, and an allegation of total neglect against them will not survive a bank statement. Whichever side you are on, the remittance record is the document.
This page is written for parents, and it would be dishonest to pretend every application is justified. Some are made under the influence of one sibling against another, some follow a family quarrel that has nothing to do with care, and some are about a property dispute wearing a different name.
If that is your position, the answer is evidence, filed on time, and nothing else works.
What does not help, in every one of these files: describing the parent as ungrateful, cutting off what you had been providing once the notice arrives, or refusing to appear. We prepare the reply and the affidavits to your advocate’s instructions, for whichever side of this engages us first — never both.
| Question | What answers it |
|---|---|
| Are you a senior citizen or parent within the Act? | Proof of age, and proof of the relationship |
| Are you unable to maintain yourself? | Pension slips, bank statements, what you spend, medical costs |
| Was there a transfer, and when? | The certified copy of the registered deed, with its date |
| Was there a condition of maintenance? | The recital, or the collateral writing, or the circumstances |
| Has it been broken? | Dated instances — what was withheld, when, and who saw it |
| Is somebody else in occupation with their own rights? | Who lives there, since when, and on what basis |
| What has the respondent actually provided? | Transfers and bills — this cuts both ways |
There is a particular cruelty in this subject: the person who most needs help is often the one whose money is being held by the person they are complaining about. The free legal services system covers exactly this, and senior citizens are among the categories entitled to it. There is a legal services committee sitting in every court complex, the Delhi State Legal Services Authority publishes what is available along with a helpline, and asking costs nothing and commits you to nothing. We have not printed any income figure because it is revised. Walk up to that desk, or ask us on the call and we will tell you which desk it is.
One folder, in date order, and give a second copy to somebody outside the house. Your written account made early. Proof of age, identity and relationship. The certified copy of the deed and anything signed with it. Pension and bank statements with the disputed entries marked. Medical papers. Every letter or notice sent or received, with proof of how it was sent. Every Tribunal paper with the date you received it written on it. And one sheet at the front with the dates.
The second copy matters more here than on any other page of this site. Files kept in the house have a way of disappearing in exactly the households these proceedings come from.
| What was done | What it cost |
|---|---|
| Signed a gift deed with no mention of being looked after | A Section 23 case that has to be built from the surrounding circumstances instead of from a line in the deed |
| Chose a gift over a will so the family would be reassured | Ownership gone in a day, and a proceeding to get it back |
| Threw away the note signed the same day as the deed | The exact document Urmila Dixit turned on |
| Used this route for a large monthly amount | Ran into the ceiling written into the Act |
| Believed a lawyer was not permitted and appeared alone on a property claim | A Section 23 case argued without the judgments that decide it |
| Assumed the Tribunal could only cancel the deed, not restore possession | A separate suit planned that was not needed after 2025 |
| Treated a daughter-in-law’s residence right as nothing | An eviction order that did not survive |
| Let the sixty-day appeal period pass while the family talked | An order that became final |
| Kept the only copy of the file at home | Papers that were no longer there when they were needed |
| As the child: ignored the notice because it was “just family” | A summary matter decided on one side’s version |
Proof of age and identity, and proof of the relationship to whoever you are proceeding against. The property documents, with a certified copy of any transfer you made and anything executed alongside it. Your pension and bank statements. A note of what you spend and what you owe. Medical papers and prescriptions. Photographs, messages or letters that record what has been said or done. Names and numbers of anyone outside the house who knows the situation. Any earlier notice, complaint or proceeding. And your own dated account of events.
Add affidavits sworn before an oath commissioner where they are required, and translations of anything not in English or Hindi prepared before the date rather than at the counter.
Documents, and nothing beyond them. Nobody here is an advocate, nobody appears before any Tribunal, and nobody here will tell you whether your transfer can be set aside — that depends on the deed, the collateral papers and the facts, and it is for counsel. What we do is the maintenance petition and the application to the Tribunal as your advocate settles them, the petition under Section 23, the reply where you are the respondent, the legal notice and the reply to one, the affidavits and their attestation, certified copies, translations, the appeal and execution papers — and, on the preventive side, the will, gift deed drawn with the condition in it, relinquishment deed, family settlement or cancellation deed.
Court work is for your advocate, whose fee is engaged and paid by you directly; we do not quote, collect or share it. The directory is free to open and free to write through, it runs A to Z, and no listing on it was bought.
Open any service page and that document’s price is on it, before you order and before you speak to anybody. Anything payable to a government office or an oath commissioner is listed separately from our figure, because it is not our money and it does not come to us.
You hear the whole figure before work begins and nothing is taken in advance. And on this subject we will say two unprofitable things plainly. If you are a senior citizen whose money is being controlled by somebody else, tell us on the call — a good deal of what you need is free, and you should not be paying us for it. And if you have not yet signed anything, the cheapest document we will ever prepare for you is the one that stops this page from applying to you at all.
Listed alphabetically. We do not rank, rate or feature advocates, and nobody pays for a position here — the reason is on our Find an Advocate page. Neither reading a profile nor writing to somebody through it costs anything.
Tell us what stage you are at — thinking about transferring property, already signed, or already being kept out of your own home. We will tell you what a complete set of papers would contain, what the Tribunal actually acts on, and which of the two routes fits what you need — and put the directory in front of you. If money is being controlled by somebody else, say so, and we will tell you what is free. Searching the directory is free and no commission from anybody on it reaches us.
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