Family issue

Dear Sir,
Your wife is having a share in the properties, and money left by her deceased father. She may immediately file a suit for partition claiming a suit from her mother and siblings if any and also get interim order freezing the accounts of mother.

Dear Client,
If your father-in-law passes away intestate, i.e, without any WILL, then all the surviving legal heirs are entitled to an equal share in the property (both movable and immovable and ancestral and self-acquired) following the Hindu law of inheritance. After the amendment of the Hindu Succession Act in 2005, daughters regardless of their marital status, were given the right to claim their share both in ancestral property and self-acquired property(if left intestate) of their parents. A legal heir certificate is issued by the government(Municipal Authority or Collector or Tehashildar) for those individuals whose parent/husband has passed away without leaving a will. A legal heir certificate is required to establish a relationship for claims relating to Insurance, pension, retirement benefits, or service benefits of central and state government departments, Government undertakings, etc. However, since the insurance and PF money are now under the custody of your mother-in-law, a legal heir certificate is of no use to settle the claim and her daughter cannot claim her share of the same as well as ancestral property in the absence of an order from the Civil Court. Even if the relationship between the mother and daughter gets soured, try to resolve the issue mutually and amicably otherwise, a civil suit may drag your wife a couple of months or years to get the fruit of a legal battle that involves litigation costs and also harms the social image of both.