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67. Of the proposition that a wife is a gotraja-sapinda of her husband, we do not understand that the first branch, viz., that she is a gotraja of the husband, has been denied. Before marriage she should be of a different gotra from that of her husband [Manu., ch. III, pl. 5; Steele on Hindu Law and Customs (1st edn.) p. 33--(2nd edn.) p. 26; Max Miller San. Lit., p. 387]; but that, on her marriage, the wife enters the gotra (family) of her husband, is a fact familiar to the ears of all acquainted with Hindu usage in this Presidency. Mr. Steele, in his note to the page in his book just mentioned, says: "After marriage a wife's gotra becomes that of her husband". To the came effect are the answers of the sastris to question 1, p. 231, and question 3, p. 233, of 1 West and Buhler; [see also note (2) to Dhoolubh Bhai v. Jeevee, 1 Borr. at p. 78]

68. Thenceforward she recites the triple invocation to the manes of the ancestors of her husband (Manu., ch. IX, pl. 28; Cole. Dig., bk. V, ch. VIII, pl. 399--400) and after his death she makes offerings to his manes (Mayukha ch. IV, Section 8, pl. 2: Mitak., ch. II, Section I, pl. 6). After her death her husband's family alone can perform her funeral rites (1 West and Buhler 222; Cole. Dig., bk. V, ch., VIII., pl. 432).

69. Incomplete accordance with this doctrine, the Mitakshara (Chap. II, Section V, pl. I) and the Vyavahara Mayukha (Ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 18), include the paternal grandmother amongst the gotrajas The Mitakshara (Ch. II, Section V, pl. 5), also consistently names the paternal great-grandmother amongst them. These instances suffice to show that we cannot, in this Presidency, treat the word "gotraja" as confined to males. It is observable that, although Mr. Monier Williams, in his Dictionary (page 297, column 2), gives to that word the too limited meaning of 'born in the same family', adding, however, also the meaning of 'relation' or 'gentile', he is careful to refrain from describing it as denoting any one gender more than another. Visvesvara in discussing, in the Subodhini, the rights of the paternal grandmother as laid down in the Mitakshara, says that there is no objection to understand the word 'gotrajas' in the sense of 'male and female gotrajas' (1 West and Buhler 146), and he, as we shall subsequently see, gives effect to that opinion. Those authorities and the instances of female gotrajas already specified, render it unnecessary, I think, to endeavour to fortify our opinion by resort to the ambiguous case of a sister, whom Nilakantha in the Vyavahara Mayukha brings in as an heir after the paternal grandmother, which the sister undoubtedly is in this Presidency [Vinayek Anandrao v.. Lakshmibai, (l Bom. H.C.R., 117, 126; s.c, 9 Moo. Ind. App., 516)]. It seems to me that he introduces her rather on the ground of sapinda-ship than of gotra-ship, but calls to his aid a quibbling play upon the term 'gotra' as a make-weight. The passage (Stokes' Hindu Law, Vyav. Mayukha, ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 19) relating to the sister is, in Mr. Borradaile's translation, so infelipitously rendered as to be, especially towards its conclusion, absolutely unintelligible. In a translation, made for the purposes of this suit by competent scholars, and approved by this Court, it runs thus:"19. In case of the non-existence of that (the paternal grandmother) the sister (takes) according to the dictum of Manu. (Chap. IX, pl. 187; Cole. Dig., bk. V, ch. VIII, pl. 434) that who ever is the nearest sapinda his should be the property'; and according to the V text of Brihaspati (Cole. Dig., bk. V., ch. VIII, pl. 437, Clause 4) that where there are many jnati, sakulyas and bandhavas, among them whoever is the nearest he should take the property of the childless; she the sister also being born in the brother's gotra, and so there being no difference of gotrajatva (the state of being born in the gotra). But (says an objector) there is no sagotrata (state of being in the same gotra). True, but neither is that stated here as a reason for taking property" Sagotra is an abbreviation of samanagotra, which means "in the same gotra", or "a person in the same gotra". Nilakantha's concluding sentence amounts to no more than an assertion that the sister was at her, birth a gotraja of her father and brother, which is true, but is followed by what is tantamount to an admission that on her entrance into the married state (which her religious law imperatively required her to assume) she ceased to be their gotraja, i.e., she was no longer a sagotra. So far, therefore, as gotra-ship, as understood in this Presidency, is an essential qualification for inheritance, she, if her marriage preceded her brother's death, would not be qualified to succeed to his estate, inasmuch as, after her marriage and consequent transfer to the gotra of her husband, the only relation which existed between her and the family in which she was born, was sapinda-ship and not gotra-ship. It is worthy of note that Nilakantha seeks to justfiye the introduc tion of the sister as an heir by reference to a text of Brihaspati (alias Vrihaspati which, like the text of Manu, also relied upon by Nilakantha, does not specify the sister; whereas there is another text of Brihaspati that does expressly name her, but apparently introduces her at an earlier stage of the succession. It is as follows:"But she, who is his sister, is next entitled to take the share: this law concerns him who leaves no issue, nor wife, nor father. nor mother" (Cole. Dig., bk. V, ch. VIII, pl. 407, Clause 3). The words "nor mother" have been added to that text by the translator, Mr. Colebrooke, in conformity with another text of Brihaspati (Cole. Dig., bk. V, ch. VIII, pl. 423, and see Manu Ibid., pl. 424), which provides for the succession of the mother to a son (who dies leaving neither wife nor male issue), unless she consent to waive her right in favour of the brother of the deceased. Some of the Bombay sastris have been so far influenced by Nilakantha's play upon the term "gotra" as to style the sister 'gotraja' as well as sapinda, 1 West and Buhler, 150--152, and see p. 155. The better opinion seems, however, to me to be that which would regard her heirship as dependent either on the special mention of her by Brihaspati and Nilakantha, or upon her sapinda-ship. The assertion of the latter that she has 'gotrajatva', i.e., the state of being born in the gotra, substantially amounts to no more than a statement that she is a sapinda.

81. Messrs. West and Buhler (l West and Buhler, p. 145 note) say that the Vedic text may be translated thus: "Women are considered disqualified to drink the soma juice, and receive no portion (of it at the sacrifice)".

82. It should, perhaps, be mentioned that Mitra Misra, in the above passage of the Vira Mitrodaya, probably quoting from memory, as was his habit (see the note to 2 West and Buhler, 100) has apparently (if the translation furnished to us be correct) misrepresented that portion of Jimuta Vahana's arguments contained is chap. XI, Section VI, pl. 10 of Mr. Colebrooke's translation of the Daya Bhaga. He (Mitra Misra) represents Jimuta Vahana as speaking of "the grandson through the daughter of the father" as born in the gotra of his mother's father, which cannot be true. What was probably meant by Jimuta Vahana was "he, too, being by such offering connected with the gotra". Again, Mitra Misra in the same place describes Jimuta Vahana as saying of the female sapindas "these not being born in the gotra". What Jimuta Vahana probably meant was what Colebrooke has translated him as having said, viz., "females related as sapindas, since these also sprung from the same line". For the word "since", perhaps, it might be well to substitute "notwithstanding that". Finally, with respect to the Vira Mitrodaya, I should observe that it is not regarded so much here as at Benares, and occupies a place, amongst the works of authority in this Presidency, far below the Mitakshara and Mayukha, and is not accepted when in conflict with them.

110. The Mitakshara is the leading authority on the Hindu law of inheritance for this Presidency, but it is subject [see Viziarangam v. Lakshman (8 Bom. H.C. Rep., 244, O.C.J.) and Krishnaji v. Pandurang, (12 Bom. H.C. Rep., 65)] to an exception in the island of Bombay, where the doctrines of the Vyavahara Mayukha predominate. It must be seen, therefore, whether, on the point we are considering, the Vyavahara Mayukha makes a provision different from that of the Mitakshara.

111. As regards the capacity of women to inherit, the two works agree. Nilakantha says that the paternal grandmother is the first amongst the gotraja-sapindas (Vyav. Mayukha, ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 18); and this is in accordance with his adoption in the Sanskara Mayukha (M.S., 44) of Vijnyanesvara's theory of the sapinda-relationship as arising from blood or bodily connexion rather than from sharing in common oblations. He also admits the sister (Vyav. Mayukha, ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 19); and this, again, denotes his acceptance of women's heritable capacity as a leading principle. But it also takes him aside altogether from Vijnyanesvara's line of succession. According to the Mitakshara, "gotraja" is equivalent to "samana-gotra" (i.e., connected by gotra); and a sister who by marriage had passed, or was to pass, of necessity, into another gotra would be postponed to all within the gotra of the propositus. Nilakantha says "gotraja" means "born in the gotra", and that after the specified heirs the sister takes as the nearest to the propositus. In this interpretation of "gotraja" he agrees with Devanda Bhatta, the author of the Smriti Chandrika, but the latter limits the term, as we have seen, to males. Having thus admitted the father's daughter as a gotraja-sapinda, it would have been a logical extension of Nilakantha's doctrine to admit the grandfather's daughter and the daughters of other ascendants next after males in the same degree, They are all born in the gotra, and, therefore, according to his reasoning, gotraja-sapindas entitled to take according to their propinquity. Messrs. West and Buhler say (1 West and Buhler, 148): "At all events he would place the daughters of male gotraja-sapindas amongst the heirs bearing this name". Yet it does not, on full consideration, seem possible to maintain with confidence this induction from the single instance given by the author. On failure of the sister, Nilakantha says (Vyav. Mayukha, ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 20), the grandfather and half-brother are to inherit together; and then, without making any provision for the grandfather's daughter, he proceeds to the great-grandfather, the uncle and the half-brother's sons. The introduction of the sister as a gotraja-sapinda is thus counterbalanced by the omission of the paternal aunt, and we are thrown back on the (Vyav. Mayukha, ch. IV, Section VIII, pl. 18) preceding placitum for such guidance as it may afford in determining generally what females rank or not as gotraja-sapindas.