Islamic Inheritance Calculator India (2026): How Muslim Shares Are Worked Out

An Islamic inheritance calculator does four things in a fixed order: it deducts funeral costs, debts and any bequest of up to one third from the estate, it gives the Quranic fixed shares to the sharers (spouse, parents, daughters without sons, certain siblings), it hands the remainder to the residuaries with sons taking twice a daughter's share, and it applies hajb, the exclusion rules that remove more distant relatives when closer ones are alive. In India this is not optional arithmetic. Section 2 of the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act 1937 makes Muslim Personal Law the rule of decision in intestate succession for Muslims, except for agricultural land. This guide walks through the shares, three worked examples in rupees, and the Indian documents that move the money afterwards, with links to the estate planning hub for the planning side.

What the law says before the calculator starts

The 1937 Act is short. Section 2 lists intestate succession, special property of females, marriage and its dissolution, maintenance, dower, guardianship, gifts, trusts and wakfs (other than charitable ones) as matters where 'the rule of decision in cases where the parties are Muslims shall be the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat)', notwithstanding any custom to the contrary. The carve-out for agricultural land means that in most states farmland devolves under state tenancy and land laws, not under faraid. Kerala removed that carve-out through Kerala Act 42 of 1963, so in Kerala agricultural land also follows Shariat. If your family holds farmland outside Kerala, a calculator's output for that land is advisory, not what the revenue office will record.

Section 3 of the same Act lets a Muslim file a declaration so that adoption, wills and legacies are also governed by Shariat. In practice Indian courts already apply Muslim law to a Muslim's will, which is why the one-third limit on bequests matters; the one-third wasiyyah rule article covers how courts enforce it. The Indian Succession Act 1925 largely steps aside for Muslims: section 212(2) says the rule requiring letters of administration before claiming an intestate's property does not apply to a 'Muhammadan', and the probate requirement in the old section 213 never applied to Muslim wills. What remains of the 1925 Act for Muslim families is Part X, the succession certificate, discussed below.

The fixed shares a calculator must get right

The fixed shares come from three verses of Surah An-Nisa. Verse 11 gives children the rule 'the share of the male will be twice that of the female', two or more daughters alone two thirds, one daughter alone one half, each parent one sixth when there are children, the mother one third when there are no children and the parents are the only heirs, and the mother one sixth when there are siblings, all 'after the fulfilment of bequests and debts'. Verse 12 sets the spouse shares: a husband takes one half if his wife left no child and one quarter if she did; a wife takes one quarter if her husband left no child and one eighth if he did, shared between co-wives. Verse 176 covers the childless person with siblings: one full sister takes one half, two take two thirds, and mixed brothers and sisters split as residuaries two to one.

Two refinements separate a good calculator from a rough one. First, when the fixed shares add up to more than the estate (for example a husband, both parents and one daughter), every share is scaled down proportionally; the classical term is awl. Second, when the fixed shares add up to less than the estate and no residuary exists, the surplus is returned to the sharers in proportion to their shares, excluding the spouse in the Hanafi view; that is radd. A calculator that silently stops at 100 percent or leaves a remainder unassigned is wrong, and you should look for one that names awl and radd in its output.

Worked example 1: a widow with two sons and a daughter

A Hyderabad businessman dies leaving his wife, two sons and one daughter. His parents died before him. After funeral costs, repaying a ₹6 lakh business debt and paying the ₹2 lakh of mahr he still owed his wife, which is a debt against the estate and not part of her inheritance, the distributable estate is ₹1 crore. He left no will. The wife takes one eighth because there are children: ₹12,50,000. The remaining ₹87,50,000 goes to the children as residuaries in five equal units, two for each son and one for the daughter. Each unit is ₹17,50,000, so each son receives ₹35,00,000 and the daughter ₹17,50,000. The four figures add back to exactly ₹1 crore, which is the first sanity check any calculator should pass.

Worked example 2: parents and one daughter

A Lucknow schoolteacher dies leaving his wife, his father, his mother and one daughter, with no son. The estate after debts is ₹48 lakh. The wife takes one eighth (₹6,00,000), the mother one sixth (₹8,00,000), the daughter one half as the only daughter (₹24,00,000) and the father one sixth (₹8,00,000). Those fixed shares total 23/24 of the estate, leaving 1/24, or ₹2,00,000, unassigned. Because the father is the nearest male agnate he takes that remainder as a residuary on top of his sixth, ending with ₹10,00,000. This is the pattern most online calculators get right for the parents but wrong for the daughter when the user forgets to tick 'no son'; with a son present the daughter's half disappears and she shares the residue at 2:1 instead.

Change one fact and awl appears. If the deceased were a woman leaving a husband, both parents and one daughter, the shares would be one quarter, one sixth, one sixth and one half, which sum to 13/12. On a ₹60 lakh estate every share is multiplied by 12/13: the husband receives ₹13,84,615, each parent ₹9,23,077 and the daughter ₹27,69,231, rounding to the rupee. A calculator showing 108 percent or stopping with an error has not implemented awl.

Worked example 3: no children, siblings inherit

A Kochi engineer dies at 38 leaving his wife, one full brother and two full sisters. He had no children and both parents had died. The estate after debts is ₹40 lakh. With no child the wife takes one quarter: ₹10,00,000. Under verse 176 the siblings take the remaining ₹30,00,000 as residuaries, the brother counting as two units and each sister as one, so four units of ₹7,50,000. The brother receives ₹15,00,000 and each sister ₹7,50,000. Had the father been alive, the siblings would have received nothing at all, which brings us to hajb.

Hajb: who blocks whom when a result looks wrong

Hajb means exclusion. There are two kinds. Hajb hirman removes an heir entirely because a closer relative is alive; hajb nuqsan reduces a share without removing the heir, as when children push a wife from one quarter to one eighth, or when two or more siblings push the mother from one third to one sixth even though those siblings may themselves be excluded by the father. Most 'the calculator must be broken' complaints come from hajb hirman, so the main rules are worth listing.

• The father excludes all brothers and sisters, whether full, paternal or maternal, and excludes the paternal grandfather.
• A son excludes grandchildren through any son, and together with the father excludes every sibling.
• Any child, or the father, excludes maternal (uterine) half-siblings completely.
• The mother excludes both grandmothers; the father excludes the paternal grandmother.
• A full brother excludes paternal half-brothers; full and paternal brothers are excluded in turn by a son, son's son or father.
• In Hanafi law the paternal grandfather, when the father is dead, steps into the father's place and excludes siblings, a point on which other Sunni schools differ.
• Grandchildren through a predeceased son receive nothing while a living son exists; a wasiyyah of up to one third is the classical remedy for them.

A good calculator asks you to enter every living relative, including those who will end up with zero, because an excluded heir can still reduce another's share. The mother's drop to one sixth in the presence of siblings who themselves inherit nothing is the standard example. If a tool asks only for 'heirs who get a share', it cannot apply hajb nuqsan correctly.

Where the one-third wasiyyah sits in the sequence

Verse 11 places the distribution 'after the fulfilment of bequests and debts', so the calculator's inputs are the net estate after funeral expenses, debts including unpaid mahr, and the bequest. Under Muslim law as applied in India the bequest cannot exceed one third of what remains after debts and cannot go to a Quranic heir without the consent of the other heirs after the death. A will that gives a flat to one son and splits the rest 'as per Shariat' therefore does not work as drafted unless the other heirs agree. If you are drafting, the complete guide to Islamic wills in India covers what a valid wasiyyah can and cannot do, the Islamic will hub collects the templates and services, and Yellow's Custom Will, priced on request on getyellow.in, is drafted to meet 'any personal laws that apply to you'; its standard online wills were listed at ₹2,499, ₹3,999 and ₹5,999 plus GST when we checked.

What the calculator cannot do: Indian paperwork after the shares

A faraid output is a set of fractions. Turning them into bank balances and property records needs Indian documents. For bank deposits, shares, mutual funds and other 'securities', the instrument is a succession certificate under Part X of the Indian Succession Act 1925. Section 371 sends the application to the District Judge where the deceased ordinarily resided, section 372 requires a signed petition listing the debts and securities, section 374 says the certificate names those specific debts and securities, section 380 gives it effect throughout India, and section 381 makes it conclusive against the banks and companies that pay out on it. Court fees on the certificate are set by state law and are commonly a percentage of the value claimed; check the Court Fees schedule for your state before filing rather than relying on any figure a calculator shows.

For immovable property, families usually start with a legal heir certificate from the local revenue authority (the tehsildar or equivalent, under state rules) and then apply for mutation of the property record at the municipal or revenue office. A nominee on a bank account or demat account receives the money as a trustee for the heirs; nomination does not override faraid. None of this requires letters of administration for a Muslim intestate, because section 212(2) of the 1925 Act excludes Muslims from that requirement. The guide to Muslim inheritance without a will in India goes through the process step by step.

How to use an online calculator and check it

• Compute the net estate first: assets at current value, minus funeral costs, debts, unpaid mahr and any bequest up to one third.
• Enter every living relative in the categories offered, including those you expect to receive nothing.
• Confirm the tool asks whether the deceased was male or female, since spouse shares differ.
• Check that the output sums to exactly 100 percent, or that it names awl or radd when it does not.
• Re-run with one relative removed to see whether the exclusion behaviour matches the hajb list above.
• Treat agricultural land outside Kerala as a separate calculation under state law.

HalalWallet India's tools page carried a zakat calculator and a home financing calculator when this was written; an inheritance calculator is not yet part of the Indian edition, so use a reputable faraid tool and verify it against the three worked examples here.

Our view: who should calculate, and who should call a lawyer

If the heirs are a spouse, children and perhaps parents, and the assets are bank accounts, mutual funds and a self-occupied flat, a calculator and a succession certificate are enough; the three examples above cover most such households. If there are no sons, if a son died before the parent leaving children, if there is agricultural land outside Kerala, or if the deceased left a will that favours one heir, get a lawyer who practises Muslim personal law, because those are the cases where hajb, the one-third rule and state land law collide. Either way, write the will while alive. Facts checked against quran.com, indiacode.nic.in, getyellow.in on 4 October 2026.

Frequently asked questions

What share does a daughter get in her father's property in Islam?

One half if she is the only child, two thirds shared if there are two or more daughters and no son, and a residuary share equal to half a brother's if there is a son. Under section 2 of the 1937 Shariat Act these shares apply to an Indian Muslim father's estate except agricultural land outside Kerala, and they are calculated after debts, unpaid mahr and any bequest of up to one third.

Is a Hanafi inheritance calculator different from a general Islamic one?

The fixed shares are the same across Sunni schools, so most results match. Differences appear in edge cases: the Hanafi school lets the paternal grandfather exclude siblings, excludes the spouse from radd (the return of surplus), and gives distant kindred a place when no sharer or agnate exists. Most Indian Muslims follow Hanafi law, so choose a calculator that states its school and, if possible, shows the Hanafi result.

What is hajb in Muslim inheritance?

Hajb is exclusion. Hajb hirman removes an heir completely because a nearer relative is alive, for example the father excluding all siblings. Hajb nuqsan reduces a share without removing the heir, for example children reducing a widow from one quarter to one eighth. A calculator must apply both, and it must count excluded relatives when they still reduce someone else's share.

Which Indian document do heirs need after calculating the shares?

For bank balances, shares and mutual funds, a succession certificate from the District Judge under Part X of the Indian Succession Act 1925, which lists the specific debts and securities and is valid throughout India. For property, a legal heir certificate from the revenue authority followed by mutation of the record. Muslims do not need letters of administration, because section 212(2) excludes them from that requirement.

Is agricultural land divided by faraid in India?

Not in most states. Section 2 of the 1937 Shariat Act excludes 'questions relating to agricultural land', so farmland devolves under state tenancy and land-revenue laws, which often follow different rules. Kerala removed the exclusion through Kerala Act 42 of 1963, so Kerala farmland follows Muslim law. Run agricultural land as a separate calculation and take state-specific legal advice.