family - Indian Laws - General

According to Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd edition, ''family' means- the group consisting of parents and their children, whether living together or not; in a wider sense, all those who are nearly connected by blood or affinity; a person's children regarded collectively; those descended or claiming descent from a common ancestor; a house, kindred, lineage; a race; a people or group of peoples. According to Aristotle's Politics I, it is the characteristic of man that he alone has any sense of good and evil, or just and unjust, and the association of living beings who have this sense make a family and a State. The word ''family always signifies a group. Plurality of persons is an essential attribute of a family. A single person, male or female, does not constitute a family. He or she would remain, what is inherent in the very nature of things, an individual, a lonely wayfarer till per chance he or she finds a mate. A family consisting of a single individual is a contradiction in terms. Section 2(31) of the 1961 Act treats a HUF as an entity distinct and different from an individual and it would be wrong not to keep that difference in view - C. Krishna Prasad v. CIT- 1974 (11) TMI 2 - SUPREME COURT.