Heirs not residing in tahsildar’s jurisdiction can’t be ground to deny family tree: Karnataka High Court

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Justice M.G.S. Kamal passed the order while setting aside the December 27, 2021, decision of sub-division tahsildar, Bengaluru south taluk, of rejecting the application filed by petitioner B.S. Abhinandan Kumar for issuance of the certificate. | Photo Credit: file photo

In a ruling that could benefit hundreds of families struggling to obtain ‘survivor certificates’ across the State, the High Court of Karnataka has held that revenue authorities cannot reject an application for ‘surviving family members certificates’, commonly known as genealogy tree/family tree, merely because some members of the family reside outside the territorial jurisdiction of the tahsildar concerned.

Justice M.G.S. Kamal passed the order while setting aside the December 27, 2021, decision of sub-division tahsildar, Bengaluru south taluk, of rejecting the application filed by petitioner B.S. Abhinandan Kumar for issuance of the certificate. The application was rejected mainly because some of petitioner’s family members were not residing in the tahsildar’s jurisdiction.

The court quashed even the decision of the Assistant Commissioner, who had rejected the petitioner’s appeal, filed under provisions of the Karnataka Sakala Services Act, 2011, against the tahsildar’s decision.

Noticing that procedure for issuance of survivor family members’ certificate is largely driven by government circulars, a recent one issued on July 17, 2026, rather than a dedicated legislative framework, the court said that the only reference in a law for issuing ‘surviving family member certificate’ is available in the list of services of the Revenue Department under the Sakala Act.

However, the court noted that a survivor certificate/genealogy/family tree is generally required after a family member’s death for mutation of legal heirs’ names in revenue records, claiming employment, receiving benefits from authorities, property transactions, partition suits, compensation claims, and various other administrative purposes.

Such certificates are generally issued based on the information provided by the deceased person’s legal heirs after conducting a formal local inquiry, though not mandated in law but referred to in the circulars, through village accountants or revenue inspectors, who are expected to be aware of the details of residents within their area of operation, to verify the information provided by the applicants, the court said.

Pointing out that reasons for the descendants/family members staying at different places could be various, the court said that competent authority cannot reject application merely on the premises that the some family members mentioned in the application are not residing in the jurisdiction of the tahsildar.