Jimutavahana

Jimutavahana was an Indian Sanskrit scholar of the early medieval period, active in Bengal around the twelfth century, who wrote treatises on both Hindu law and Vaishnava religious practice. His most significant work, the Dayabhaga, drew on the existing Dharmashastra literature to set out a distinct system of inheritance law that became the principal legal guide in Bengal, Assam and the surrounding region until the Hindu Succession Act of 1956 replaced it. The Dayabhaga school he founded differed from the rival Mitakshara school followed elsewhere in India chiefly in its treatment of widows, recognizing the right of a widow with no surviving son to inherit her deceased husband's property, a protection the Mitakshara approach did not extend in the same way.