Legatee

A Will creates three roles, and the exam expects you to keep them apart.

The testator is the person making the Will. The workbook adds an important limit: his rights extend only to what are legally his own.

The legatee is the person named in the Will to receive a portion of the deceased person's estate. That is the whole definition.

The executor is the person named to administer the estate.

One person can be both legatee and executor, and the law then treats him carefully. Section 141 of the Indian Succession Act says an executor who is also a legatee cannot claim a legacy in certain circumstances.

A legatee is not a nominee. A nominee receives money from an institution and, in a dispute, holds it as a trustee for the legal heirs. A legatee takes under the Will itself.

And a legatee has one procedural power worth knowing: a Will can be registered by the legatee after the testator's death.

The three roles under a Will.

Where a legatee's name actually appears in the mechanics.

• Registration. A Will may be registered within the testator's lifetime, or by the legatee after the testator's death. So registration is not lost if the testator did not get to it.
• Executor as legatee. Section 141 of the Indian Succession Act provides that an executor who is a legatee cannot claim the legacy in the circumstances that section describes. The two roles can coexist, but not without qualification.
• Letters of administration. Where the process requires it, the court grants letters of administration of the estate to the legatee.
• Establishing a right. Where an executor or legatee has to establish a legal right over the assets of the deceased, probate becomes relevant.
• Mutual Wills. In a mutual Will the executants fulfil the role of both testator and legatee, each conferring reciprocal benefits on the other. The workbook adds the condition: where the testator and legatee are different persons, a mutual Will is not viable.

Why the nominee comparison is the examinable one. Section 15.4.3 states it flatly: the nominee is not a legatee or beneficiary. Nomination is the right conferred on the holder of an investment product to appoint the person entitled to receive the monies on death. It is seen as a formal bequest authorised by the holder, but in a dispute the nominee's position is reduced to being the trustee of the bequest, with the final owners decided under the applicable laws of succession.

The one large exception is the beneficial nominee under the Insurance Act, 1938 as amended in 2015: where the nominee of a life policy is the parent, spouse, children, or spouse and children, the nominee is beneficially entitled to the amount payable and is not accountable to the other legal heirs.

The workbook attaches no figure to the legatee's role. There is no minimum share, no maximum number of legatees, no registration fee and no time limit. Section 15.2.1 is definitional, and the only numbered references around it are statutory — Section 2(h) for the definition of a Will, Section 62 for revocation, and Section 141 for the executor-legatee bar.

Illustrative figures; the workbook gives none for this role.

Mrs Chatterjee dies in Durgapur leaving a registered Will and an estate of Rs 2,10,00,000:

Her Will provides:

Three legatees, one of whom is also the executor. The elder son's duty to administer the estate sits alongside his own legacy, and Section 141 of the Indian Succession Act is precisely the provision that governs that overlap.

Now the nominee complication. The bank deposits carry a nomination in favour of the younger son, made years earlier and never updated.

On her death the bank pays the Rs 25,00,000 to the younger son, because that is what a nomination does. But he is the nominee, not the legatee, of that money. In a dispute his position is reduced to that of a trustee of the bequest, and the sister's claim under the Will stands. He must account to her for the Rs 25,00,000.

The contrast with a life policy. Had Mrs Chatterjee also held a life policy of Rs 50,00,000 nominating her younger son, the outcome would be different. As her child he is a beneficial nominee under the amended Insurance Act, beneficially entitled to the Rs 50,00,000 and not accountable to the other legal heirs — even if the Will said otherwise.

Same family, same death, two different rules. Rs 25,00,000 of deposits follow the Will through the legatee; Rs 50,00,000 of life cover follows the beneficial nomination.

Chapter 15 (Tools for Estate Planning), section 15.2.1, defines the testator, legatee and executor in three consecutive sentences. The role then reappears in 15.2.2 on mutual Wills, in the registration discussion, in the Section 141 executor-as-legatee bar, in the letters of administration passage and in 15.4.3 on nomination.

Expect a straight definition question separating legatee from executor, and the discriminating question the chapter is built around: is a nominee a legatee? The answer is no — section 15.4.3 says so expressly, and the beneficial nominee under the Insurance Act is the exception that proves it.

• A legatee receives; an executor administers. Two different appointments in the same Will, and the commonest one-mark error in this chapter.
• A nominee is not a legatee. The workbook states it directly. In a dispute the nominee holds as trustee of the bequest and succession law decides the final owner.
• The beneficial nominee is the exception. Where a life policy nominee is the parent, spouse or children, the amended Insurance Act, 1938 makes them beneficially entitled and not accountable to other heirs.
• An executor can also be a legatee, but Section 141 of the Indian Succession Act limits when he may claim the legacy.
• A legatee can register the Will after the testator's death. Registration is not confined to the testator's lifetime.
• A testator can only bequeath what is legally his own. A legacy over an asset held in joint tenancy, where survivorship applies, cannot take effect.
• The workbook gives no figure for this role — no minimum share and no cap on the number of legatees.