In Maharashtra the court fee for a succession certificate is charged on the debts and securities you list in the petition, and the value of the estate does not come into the calculation. The rate is the probate rate in the Maharashtra Court-fees Act, 1959, charged band by band: 2 per cent on the value up to Rs 50,000, then 4, 6 and 7.5 per cent on the parts above it. On Rs 10,00,000 of listed deposits and shares the fee comes to Rs 65,500, and the application itself carries a Rs 50 court fee stamp.

Willjini is India's most trusted Succession Planning company. WillJini drafts the petition and the schedule of debts and securities that goes with it, and files both in the court that has jurisdiction. The service fee is quoted on enquiry, and the court fee set out below is fixed by statute and paid to the court.

Is a succession certificate the document I actually need?

A succession certificate is a civil court order that authorises you to collect the debts and securities owed to someone who has died. Banks, companies and depositories ask for it before they release a balance, a deposit or a shareholding. It does not establish who the surviving family members are, and it cannot transfer a flat, a house or land.

If the office asking wants proof of who the heirs are rather than authority to collect money, the document is an heirship certificate, granted under Bombay Regulation VIII of 1827, and how to apply for a legal heir certificate in Maharashtra sets out that route. The difference between a legal heir certificate and a succession certificate explains which document a bank will accept.

Related guides:

• Is probate of a will mandatory in Maharashtra?
• What the Indian Succession Act, 1925 covers
• Obtaining a succession certificate or a letter of administration

What will the court charge me for a succession certificate in Maharashtra?

The court fee for a succession certificate in Maharashtra is set by Schedule I Article 11 of the Maharashtra Court-fees Act, 1959, and it is charged at the probate rate in Article 10 on the amount or value of the debts and securities specified in the certificate. Article 11 reads:

11. Certificate under Part X of the Indian Succession Act, 1925 (XXXIX of 1925). The fee leviable in the case of a probate (Article 10) on the amount or value of any debt or security specified in the certificate under section 374 of the Act, and [two times] this fee on the amount or value of any debt or security to which the certificate is extended under section 376 of the Act.

The Article 10 rate it points to is charged band by band, so the top rate is never applied to the whole value:

The Act's own words for the first band are "When the amount or value of the property in respect of which the grant of probate or letters is made exceeds one thousand rupees, on the amount or value upto fifty thousand rupees", and every band after it is charged "on the part of the amount or value in excess of" the threshold below. Against the fourth band the fee column prints two lines, "Seven and half per cent." and "Subject to the maximum of 75,000 rupees."

The fee on two common amounts is calculated as follows:

The application also carries a fixed court fee stamp. Schedule II Article 18(c) covers an application "for a certificate under part X of the Indian Succession Act, 1925 (XXXIX of 1925), or Bombay Regulation VIII of 1827 or any corresponding law for the time being in force", and where the value exceeds five thousand rupees that application carries a fifty rupee court fee stamp.

The small estate exemption in section 20(1)(iv) does not apply to a succession certificate. It exempts a certificate only "where the amount or value of the property … does not exceed one thousand rupees", and it exempts it only "save as regards debts and securities". Debts and securities are the whole content of a succession certificate, so the exemption does not apply.

Where a family takes a succession certificate first and later needs probate or letters of administration over the same estate, the proviso to Article 10 says that "the fee payable in respect of the later grant shall be reduced by the amount of the fee paid in respect of the former grant". The figures above are Maharashtra's own, and what a succession certificate costs in India sets out what other states charge.

Where does the 2 or 3 per cent figure come from?

The central Court-Fees Act, 1870 is where the 2 and 3 per cent figures come from, and that Act no longer applies to a court filing in Maharashtra. Section 49 and Schedule IV of the Maharashtra Court-fees Act, 1959 repealed it in its application to the pre-Reorganisation State of Bombay, the Vidarbha region and the Kutch and Saurashtra areas, so far as it relates to court fees. Since then the rate here has been the Article 10 bands set out above.

Article 11 charges on the debts and securities specified in the certificate and on nothing else, so a percentage worked out on the value of an estate produces a figure no Maharashtra court asks for. A family with a flat worth Rs 2 crore and Rs 6,00,000 in bank deposits is charged on the six lakh.

The second proviso to section 49 fixes which version of the rate applies: "all the fees shall be charged and collected under this Act at the rate in force on the date on which the document chargeable to court-fee is or was presented." The figures above are those printed in the Law and Judiciary Department's consolidated reprint of the Act, Text as on 9 May 2024.

How do I work out the amount the fee is charged on?

You add together the debts and the securities the certificate is to cover, and the Article 10 bands are applied to that total. Those are the items the Judge specifies in the certificate under section 374 of the Indian Succession Act, and each of them is valued on the day you apply to include it. Article 11's first Note fixes the amount of a debt as "its amount including interest on the day on which the inclusion of the debt in the certificate is applied for", and its second Note fixes the value of a security as "its market value on the day on which the inclusion of the security in the certificate is applied for".

Rule 377 of the Bombay High Court's Original Side Rules requires a schedule to be annexed to the petition in Form No. 111, headed "Schedule of debts and securities of the deceased", and that form carries a table of debts and a table of securities, each ending in a total, with the securities valued at the date of the application.

Schedule I Article 12 sits alongside Article 11 and is charged on a different amount. It covers a certificate under Bombay Regulation VIII of 1827 and charges the same Article 10 rate "on the amount or value of the property in respect of which the certificate is granted", which is the property itself rather than the debts and securities.

Anything you leave out of the schedule can be added later, and the addition is charged at twice the rate. Section 376 of the Indian Succession Act lets a District Judge extend a certificate to a debt or security that was not originally specified in it, and Article 11 charges two times the fee on whatever is added that way. The items that get missed are a dormant account, a small shareholding in a company that stopped sending statements, and a deposit in a bank that has since merged into another. WillJini traces and values every account, deposit and folio the certificate has to cover, so that the schedule filed with the petition is the whole of it.

Which court do I file in?

You file before the District Judge in whose jurisdiction the deceased ordinarily resided at the time of death. Section 371 of the Indian Succession Act sets it out: "The District Judge within whose jurisdiction the deceased ordinarily resided at the time of his death, or, if at that time he had no fixed place of residence, the District Judge, within whose jurisdiction any part of the property of the deceased may be found, may grant a certificate under this Part."

The property rule applies only where the deceased had no fixed place of residence, so a family cannot choose to file where the bank is. Where the deceased had a fixed place of residence, the application goes to the District Judge for that place, even if the family now lives in another city. Section 2(bb) defines "District Judge" as the Judge of a Principal Civil Court of original jurisdiction.

In Greater Bombay these applications go to the Original Side of the Bombay High Court, which publishes both the rules and the fee for them. Rule 370 of the Bombay High Court (Original Side) Rules, 1980 lists a succession certificate among "non-contentious matters", and Rule 371 gives the Prothonotary and Senior Master power to "exercise in non-contentious matters the powers conferred by the Indian Succession Act, 1925, on the District Judge". The court's Original Side fee schedule reproduces Article 11 word for word as one of its own categories, including the two times charge on an extension.

WillJini establishes where the deceased ordinarily resided at the time of death and files in the court that covers that address.

Can I apply through Aaple Sarkar?

Aaple Sarkar does not issue a succession certificate, and no other Maharashtra portal issues one. The portal delivers services notified under the Maharashtra Right to Public Services Act, each with a named officer and a published time limit. A succession certificate is a proceeding in a civil court under Part X of the Indian Succession Act, 1925, so it is not a notified service and cannot be on that list.

The portal's Revenue Department list runs to sixteen services, among them the income certificate, the age nationality and domicile certificate, the temporary residence certificate, the senior citizen certificate and the solvency certificate. None of the sixteen is a succession certificate, an heirship certificate or a varasa certificate. Across the whole portal, the only entries that mention an heir or a succession belong to the Slum Rehabilitation Authority and concern the transfer of tenements.

If a bank or a housing society has sent you to a government counter for this, they mean either this certificate, which comes from a court, or the heirship certificate, which is applied for under Bombay Regulation VIII of 1827.

What goes into the petition?

What the petition must state is fixed by section 372(1) of the Indian Succession Act, and it is a list of facts rather than a list of documents to attach:

• (a) the time of the death of the deceased
• (b) the ordinary residence of the deceased at the time of his death and, if such residence was not within the local limits of the jurisdiction of the Judge to whom the application is made, then the property of the deceased within those limits
• (c) the family or other near relatives of the deceased and their respective residences
• (d) the right in which the petitioner claims
• (e) the absence of any impediment under section 370 or under any other provision of this Act or any other enactment, to the grant of the certificate or to the validity thereof if it were granted
• (f) the debts and securities in respect of which the certificate is applied for

The petition is signed and verified the way the Code of Civil Procedure requires a plaint to be signed and verified. Under section 372(2), an averment the person verifying it knows to be false is deemed an offence under section 198 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. Section 372(3) allows the application to be made for part only of a debt. Because the petition is a court document verified in that way, WillJini settles the family details, the residence and the schedule of debts and securities before anyone signs it.

In Greater Bombay the Bombay High Court prescribes the forms. Rule 377 requires the petition to be in Form No. 110, the schedule of assets in Form No. 111, and the petitioner's oath in Form No. 112, with a vakalatnama in Form No. 5 unless you appear in person. Form No. 120 is the bond, which section 375 lets the Judge require as security.

Rule 381 adds that the petition must be accompanied by the Prothonotary and Senior Master's certificate that the court fee has been paid, unless the Judge in Chambers directs otherwise. Rule 382 requires the petition to explain the delay where the application is first made more than three years after the death.

How long will this take?

No court in Maharashtra publishes a processing time for a succession certificate. Aaple Sarkar publishes a thirty day limit for a land records mutation entry and nothing for this one, because the Right to Public Services regime covers notified services and a proceeding in a civil court is not one.

Under section 373(1) a Judge who is satisfied that there is ground for entertaining the application "shall fix a day for the hearing thereof" and cause notice to be served on any person who in his opinion should have special notice of it, and "to be posted on some conspicuous part of the court-house". On the day fixed, "or as soon thereafter as may be practicable", the Judge decides the right to the certificate in a summary manner. Publication in a newspaper is something the Judge may direct, and it is not a step the Act requires of you.

The Bombay High Court's Rules fix a period for the grant itself. Rule 397(4) provides that no grant "shall be made until after the expiry of fourteen clear days from the date of the service of the citation or notice, and from the publication there of in newspapers, if any, and from the affixing thereof on the court house", unless the Judge in Chambers directs otherwise. Those fourteen clear days set the earliest date on which a grant may issue in that court. Where an objection is entered, Rule 406 gives the objector fourteen days to file an affidavit and requires the hearing date to be notified at least eight days in advance.

My mother left a flat. Will this certificate transfer it?

A succession certificate does not transfer immovable property, because it is granted in respect of the debts and securities specified in it and nothing else. Section 370(2) defines "security" for this Part as a closed list: government promissory notes, debentures and stock; bonds, debentures and annuities charged by Act of Parliament on the revenues of India; stock, debentures or shares in a company or other incorporated institution; debentures or other securities for money issued by or on behalf of a local authority; and anything else the State Government notifies as a security. Every item on that list is a financial instrument.

Section 372(1)(f) has the petition state the debts and securities, section 374 has the Judge specify them in the certificate, and section 381 makes the certificate conclusive "with respect to the debts and securities specified therein" and no further. Schedule VIII, which prints the statutory form of the certificate itself, has exactly two tables, headed "Debts" and "Securities", with no column for a house, a flat or land.

For land carried on the record of rights there is a separate route. Section 149 of the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966 requires anyone acquiring a right "by succession, survivorship, inheritance, partition, purchase, mortgage, gift, lease or otherwise" to report it to the Talathi within three months, and section 150 has the Talathi enter it in the register of mutations. That route governs land on the record of rights and city survey property cards. A flat in a co-operative housing society is neither, and it runs through the society under its own rules.

Do I need probate or letters of administration instead?

Whether you need probate or letters of administration instead depends on whether there was a will and, on an intestacy, on the community the deceased belonged to. Section 212(1) provides that "No right to any part of the property of a person who has died intestate can be established in any Court of Justice, unless letters of administration have first been granted by a Court of competent jurisdiction". Section 212(2) then disapplies that for the intestacy of "a Hindu, Muhammadan, Buddhist, Sikh, Jaina, Indian Christian or Parsi".

Section 370(1) decides which document applies to a given debt or security. A certificate cannot be granted for any debt or security to which a right is required by section 212 to be established by letters of administration. Where section 212(1) applies, letters of administration come first and a succession certificate is not available for those assets.

Where there was a will, section 213, which used to make probate a condition of establishing a right as executor or legatee, was omitted by the Repealing and Amending Act, 2025 (Act 37 of 2025), section 3 and the Second Schedule. That omission changed nothing for a family whose relative died without one, because section 212 was left untouched. Whether probate of a will is mandatory in Maharashtra explains whether a family actually needs to take probate.

What is a succession certificate called in Marathi?

The Maharashtra Government's Marathi term for a succession certificate is उत्तराधिकारी प्रमाणपत्र. It appears in the Maharashtra Government Gazette, Extraordinary Part IV-B No. 366 of 22 June 2026, which prints the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies (Amendment) Rules, 2026 in Marathi and then in English, so the pairing is the state's own.

The same sentence names all three documents a housing society may ask a family for. Its English text reads: "If the claimants do not come to an agreement, as to who should become the provisional member, the committee shall call upon them to produce a legal heirship certificate or succession certificate or a letter of administration from the competent court."

If a housing society has written to you in Marathi, the term in the letter tells you which of the three documents it wants, and each of the three is applied for separately.

FAQs

What is the court fee for a succession certificate in Maharashtra?

Schedule I Article 11 of the Maharashtra Court-fees Act, 1959 charges the court fee for a succession certificate in Maharashtra at the probate rate in Article 10, on the amount or value of the debts and securities specified in the certificate. That rate is 2 per cent on the value up to Rs 50,000, 4 per cent on the part above Rs 50,000 up to Rs 2,00,000, 6 per cent on the part above Rs 2,00,000 up to Rs 3,00,000, and 7.5 per cent on the part above Rs 3,00,000, subject to the maximum of 75,000 rupees against that band.

How much is the fee on Rs 10,00,000 of bank deposits and shares?

On Rs 10,00,000 of listed debts and securities the court fee is Rs 65,500, made up of Rs 1,000 on the first Rs 50,000, Rs 6,000 on the next Rs 1,50,000, Rs 6,000 on the next Rs 1,00,000 and Rs 52,500 on the Rs 7,00,000 above Rs 3,00,000. On Rs 5,00,000 the same bands give Rs 28,000. The application also carries a fifty rupee court fee stamp under Schedule II Article 18(c) where the value exceeds five thousand rupees.

When do I pay the court fee?

The court fee is paid with the application, as a deposit. Section 379(1) of the Indian Succession Act requires every application for a certificate, and every application to extend one, to be "accompanied by a deposit of a sum equal to the fee payable under the Court-Fees Act, 1870 (7 of 1870)". Section 379(2) has that deposit spent on the stamp if the application is allowed, and section 379(3) requires anything not spent to be refunded to the person who deposited it.

What happens if I leave a bank account out of the petition?

A debt or security left out of the petition can be added afterwards, and the addition is charged at twice the rate. Section 376 lets a District Judge extend a certificate to a debt or security not originally specified in it, and Schedule I Article 11 charges "[two times] this fee" on the amount or value of anything added that way.

Does a succession certificate cover a flat in a housing society?

A succession certificate does not cover a flat. It is granted in respect of the debts and securities specified in it, section 370(2) defines a security as a closed list of financial instruments, and Schedule VIII prints the form of the certificate with two tables headed "Debts" and "Securities" and nowhere to enter immovable property.

Can I get a succession certificate on Aaple Sarkar?

Aaple Sarkar does not issue a succession certificate. The portal delivers services notified under the Maharashtra Right to Public Services Act, and its Revenue Department list of sixteen services carries no succession, heirship or varasa certificate. A succession certificate is granted by a civil court under Part X of the Indian Succession Act, 1925.

What is the difference between the heirship certificate fee and the succession certificate fee in Maharashtra?

The heirship certificate fee and the succession certificate fee sit in different articles of the same Schedule and are charged on different amounts. Schedule I Article 12 covers a certificate under Bombay Regulation VIII of 1827 and charges the Article 10 rate "on the amount or value of the property in respect of which the certificate is granted". Article 11 covers the succession certificate and charges the same rate on the debts and securities specified in it under section 374.

Which court grants a succession certificate in Mumbai?

Applications in Greater Bombay go to the Original Side of the Bombay High Court, whose Rule 370 lists a succession certificate among non-contentious matters and whose Rule 371 gives the Prothonotary and Senior Master the District Judge's powers under the Indian Succession Act, 1925 in those matters. Elsewhere in the state, section 371 puts it before the District Judge where the deceased ordinarily resided at the time of death.