HC: Slow learner can’t be declared ‘mentally retarded’

Merely because a student is a slow learner and not good in her studies, she cannot be declared as ‘mentally retarded’, the Bombay high court has ruled. The court came to the aid of a 32-year-old woman who had challenged her paternal aunt being appointed as the sole trustee of her late father’s will for his properties, that included a share in a flat in Churchgate. The aunt had claimed that the girl, the sole legal heir of her father’s properties, was mentally unstable citing an IQ test.

“In my view, even if a student is a slow learner or (her) school education is not satisfactory, such a person cannot be declared as mentally retarded on that ground,” said Justice Dhanuka. The court took on record the girl’s claims that she had been affected on account of her parents’ divorce. This led to her being academically weak and she even attended a special school as her intelligent quotient was low for some time.

The girl’s parents had married in 1985 and she was born a year later. The parents obtained a customary divorce in 2002, which the girl said affected her psychologically. Her father expired in 2011 and she lived with her aunt for a few months. Subsequently, her mother filed an application and was appointed as her guardian in 2012. The aunt filed a testamentary petition in the high court in 2012, seeking probate of the man’s 2009 will. She claimed that her niece was unfit to administer the properties and sought to be appointed as the main trustee. Last year, the girl filed a petition seeking a recall of the high court’s order dispensing with her consent and grant of probate in favour of her aunt.

Justice Ramesh Dhanuka recalled a 2014 order of the high court appointing the aunt as the trustee of the properties and executor of her brother’s will. The court further imposed Rs 1 lakh as legal costs that the aunt, who had stopped paying monthly maintenance for the girl’s expenses, will have to shell out to her niece.

The court came to the aid of a 32-year-old woman, whose aunt had claimed that the girl, the sole legal heir of her father’s properties, was mentally unstable citing an IQ test