Inheritance of a widowed daughter-in-law and her two sons
11-6-2009 | IslamWeb
Question:
Aslaam-u-Alaikum. I have a question about the shares of the inheritence of my Late Brother.My brother died in a car accident and by then he was not doing anything on his own he was a nominated directoe in my Father's company. He was married , and had two sons age 3 and 5 on his death in 2006. After iddah his wife left my father's house cos she wanted to live according to her life style , she took the kids and all the valuables belonging to my brother. She stopped having any relation with my parents or any other family members initially saying that it disturbs kids and they want to come back to their fathers house, but later she changed the charges saying that we misbehaved with her after her husband , which was a complete lie. Now she is asking for my Brother's inheritence all for herself and kids, even from my father's property. For that she is making a lot of aquasations and saying that what ever jewellary and valuables she took earlier with her has nothing to do with inheritense. As my Parents are still alive and we are 5 kins of our brother. I want to know what will be the distribution status and how the inheritense calculated other than Haq Mehr and what about debt, my brother had on him. The other question is related to the relationship she broke and will not let us see the kids or even talk to them at all. How will it justify then to give their share to their mother before they get mature. Jazak Allah o Khair
Answer:
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
As regards how to distribute the inheritance of your brother, if he died leaving behind a wife, two sons, a father, a mother, brothers and sons, then each of his father and his mother gets one-sixth of the inheritance, as Allaah Says (what means): {And for one’s parents, to each one of them is a sixth of his estate if he left children.}[Quran 4:11] His wife gets one-eighth as Allaah Says about the shares of the wives (what means): {But if you leave a child, then for them (i.e. the wives) is an eighth of what you leave, after any bequest you [may have] made or debt.}[Quran 4:12] The remaining of the inheritance should be equally divided between his two sons as the Prophet said: "Give the prescribed share of inheritance to those who are liable for it and the remainder [of it] is for the nearest male blood relative." [Al-Bukhari and Muslim] However, the brothers and sisters have no right in the inheritance because they are prevented from it with the existence of the sons and the father.
Therefore, the inheritance should be divided into 48 shares; the mother gets one-sixth, which 8 shares, the father gets one-sixth, which is 8 shares as well, the wife gets one-eighth, which is 6 shares, and each son gets 13 shares.
However, the wife is not permitted to ask for the share of her husband from the inheritance of his father who is still alive; rather, even if the father died, his son who had died before him has no right in the inheritance. Therefore, she is obliged to give back the properties of her husband that she had taken because they are part of the inheritance which is the right of all the heirs, each according to his legal share.
Nonetheless, the wife has the right of fostering her two sons, but she has no authority over their wealth, so the share of the sons is not given to her unless their father had made a will to this effect. If there is no will, then it is their grandfather –the father of their father –who becomes the guardian of their wealth, and if they have no grandfather, then it is the Muslim judge (who should be the guardian of their wealth).
Besides, she is not permitted to prevent the family of her deceased husband from seeing or taking her sons during the day, but they should spend the night with her only. Finally, if you notice that the wife of your brother is obstinate (in her error), then we advise you to take the matter to an Islamic court in your country so that it would look into the matter and give each one his right.
Allaah Knows best.