Introduction

Will means the legal declaration of the intention of a person with respect to his
property, which he desires to take effect after his death. It is a unilateral document and
takes effect after the death of the person making it. It can be revoked or altered by the
maker of it at any time he is competent to dispose of his property.

A will made by a Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh or Jain is governed by the provisions of the
Indian Succession Act, 1925. However, Mohammedan are not governed by the Indian
Succession Act, 1925 and they can dispose their property according to Muslim Law.

Who can make a will?

• Every person who is of sound mind and is not a minor can make a will.
• Persons who are deaf or dumb or blind can make a will provided they are able to
know what they do by it.
• A person who is ordinarily insane may make a will during an interval in which he is
of sound mind.
• No person can make a will while he is in such a state of mind, whether arising from
intoxication or from illness or from any other cause that he does not know what he is
doing.

The Indian Succession Act, 1925, has been taken up by the Law Commission as a part
of its function of revising Central Acts of general application and importance. This
Act is the principal legislative measure in India dealing with the substantive law of
testamentary succession in regard to persons other than Muslims and intestate
succession in regard to persons other than Hindus and Muslims. It is also the principal
legislative measure dealing with the machinery of succession in regard to both
testamentary and intestate succession in respect of such persons. As will be explained
later1, the Act is a consolidating enactment in the sense that it has brought in one
place provisions scattered in several Central Acts.
The attestation, revocation (including effects of subsequent
events), alteration and revival of wills are matters dealt with in
sections 67 to 73.
The rules comprised in sections 67 to 73 could be broadly classified as follows:—
(a) effect of a benefit given by the will to an attesting witness on its validity (section
67) or on competence to prove (section 68);
(b) effect of marriage (section 69);
(c) revocation of unprivileged wills (sections 70-71) and their revival (sections 73);
(d) revocation of privileged wills (section 72).

Section 67: Effect of gift to attesting witness

 Will shall not be deemed to be insufficiently attested by reason of any benefit thereby
given either by way of bequest or by way of appointment to any person attesting it, or
to his or her wife or husband; but the bequest or appointment shall be void so far as
concerns the person so attesting or the wife or husband of such person or any person
claiming under either of them.
Explanation. —A legatee under a Will does not lose his legacy by attesting a codicil
which confirms the Will.
Amendment of section 67 which can be recommended: - Accordingly, we
recommend that section 67 should be amended by inserting the following exception in
the section before the Explanation
"Exception.
For the purposes of this section, the attestation of a will by a person to whom or to
whose spouse there is given any such benefit as is described in this section shall be
disregarded—
(a) where the means of an oral trust, a beneficial interest is conferred upon an attesting
witness who at the time of attestation is unaware of the secret trust in his favour; or
(b) where the marriage to an attesting witness of a person taking a beneficial interest
under the will takes place after the attestation; or
(c) where at the time of the attestation it could not be predicted that the attesting
witness was a person taking a beneficial interest under the will; or
(d) where the will has been witnessed by not less than two other witnesses, to whom
no such benefit as is described in this section is given by the will."

Section 68:- Witness not disqualified by interest or by being executor

No person, by reason of interest in, or of his being an executor of, a will, shall be
disqualified as a witness to prove the execution of the will or to prove the validity or
invalidity thereof.

Section 69:- Revocation of will by testator’s marriage

Every will shall be revoked by the marriage of the maker, except a will made in
exercise of a power of appointment, when the property over which the power of
appointment is exercised would not, in default of such appointment, pass to his or her
executor or administrator, or to the person entitled in case of intestacy.
Explanation. --Where a man is invested with power to determine the disposition of
property of which he is not the owner, he is said to have power to appoint such
property.
Exception: —A will be expressed to be made in contemplation of a marriage or
indicating an intention that it was so made shall not be revoked by the solemnization
of the marriage contemplated; and such an intention may be inferred from any portion
of the will showing that marriage was thought of
(2) Where the law of domicile of the maker of the will at the time of death has
different rule that rule shall prevail, and the provisions of sub-section (1) shall not
apply to the extent to which there is inconsistency between the two."
Recommendation to insert new section 69A.
In the light of the above discussion, we recommend that the Succession Act should be
amended to provide that where after a will the marriage of the testator is dissolved or
his (or her) marriage has been annulled, the will should for all purposes, be read as if
the former spouse (that is to say, the spouse whose marriage is dissolved or annulled)
had died before the testator, unless the will expressly provide otherwise.

Section 70: - Revocation of unprivileged will or codicil

No unprivileged will or codicil, nor any part thereof, shall be revoked otherwise than
by marriage, or by another will or codicil, or by some writing declaring an intention to
revoke the same and executed in the manner in which an unprivileged will is herein
before required to be executed, or by the burning, tearing, or otherwise destroying the
same by the testator or by some person in his presence and by his direction with the
intention of revoking the same.
Illustrations
(i) A has made an unprivileged will. Afterwards, A makes another unprivileged will
which purports to revoke the first. This is a revocation.
(ii) A has made an unprivileged will. Afterwards, A, being entitled to make a
privileged will, makes a privileged will, which purports to revoke his unprivileged
will. This is a revocation.

Section 71: - Effect of obliteration, interlineation or alteration in unprivileged will

The section reads as under: —
" No obliteration, interlineation or other alteration made in any unprivileged will after
the execution thereof shall have any effect, except so far as the words or meaning of
the will have been thereby rendered illegible or indiscernible, unless such alteration
has been executed in like manner as hereinbefore is required for the execution of the
will:
Provided that the will, as so altered, shall be deemed to be duly executed if the
signature of the testator and the subscription of the witnesses is made in the margin or
in some other part of the will opposite or near to such alteration, or at the foot or end
of or opposite to a memorandum referring to such alteration, and written at the end or
some other part of the will." The section is based on section 21 of the (English) Wills
Act, 1837.

Section 72:- Revocation of privileged will or codicil

A privileged will or codicil, may be revoked by the testator by an unprivileged will .or
codicil, or by any act expressing an intention to revoke it and accompanied by such
formalities as would be sufficient to give validity to a privileged will, or by the
burning, tearing or otherwise destroying the same by the testator, or by some person in
his presence and by his direction, with the intention of revoking the same.
Explanation. --In order to the revocation of a privileged will or codicil by an act
accompanied by such formalities as would be sufficient to give validity to a privileged
will, it is not necessary that the testator should at the time of doing that act be in a
situation which entitles him to make a privileged will
Section 73:- Revival of unprivileged will
(1) No unprivileged will or codicil, nor any part thereof, which has been revoked in
any manner, shall be revived otherwise than by the re-execution thereof, or by a
codicil executed in manner herein before required, and showing an intention to revive
the same.
(2) When any will or codicil, which has been partly revoked and afterwards wholly
revoked, is revived, such revival shall not extend to so much thereof as has been
revoked before the revocation of the whole thereof, unless an intention to the contrary
is shown by the will or codicil.
 Conclusion
Every person has a desire that after he dies his family will not face any problems. Be
it monetary or any family dispute, he just wants his family to stay happy. In order to
achieve this, his wish to put the division of all the property he possesses should be put
in black and white. The only way possible for him to resolve this is through a written
Will. One finds the law governing Will in the form of Indian Succession Act, 1925
which is applicable to Hindus, Buddhist, Parsees, Jain, Christians and Sikhs. The law
is not applicable to the Muslim community. Our common understanding describes
Will to be as a wish or desire of a person who bequeaths his/her property (both
immoveable and moveable) as set in the legal document after his death.

Whenever, a person dies without leaving a will that person is said to die intestate and
the testamentary law finds no application in such case. The intestate provisions under
Hindu Succession Act, 1956 are applied to Hindu, Jain, Sikh and Buddhist, Christians,
and Parsees, while the Jews are governed by Indian Succession Act, 1925. Generally,
the practice is to approach a legal adviser who would be able to highlight on every
impediment associated with the drafting of the Will. The person who desires to make
his Will is termed as the Testator if he is a male and Testatrix in case of a female. The
person who benefits from the will is called a Beneficiary
Webliography
 www.lawgist.in
 Bareactslive.com
 Slideshare.net
 Blog.ipleaders.in