Widow of retired judge sues grandson in dispute related to late husband’s will

Lawyer Arfat Selvam, the widow of retired judge G.P. Selvam, has sued her grandson for breach of confidence and defamation in a dispute related to her late husband’s will.

Mrs Selvam, a former president of the Law Society of Singapore, and her two daughters are the executors and trustees of Mr Selvam’s will.

Some details of the dispute emerged in written grounds of decision issued on March 16 by Senior Judge Tan Siong Thye.

Justice Tan was giving written reasons to explain why he upheld certain orders that Mrs Selvam and her daughters had sought while the case is going through the court process.

The orders include an injunction to restrain Mrs Selvam’s grandson, Mr Sharad Selvam Ramachandra, from disclosing confidential material, and a search order for confidential material.

The judge had in 2025 granted the orders to safeguard the confidential material and to prevent Mr Ramachandra from destroying relevant evidence of how he obtained the material.

In his bid to set aside the orders, Mr Ramachandra argued for an “iniquity exception”, where evidence of unlawful actions are not protected by the law of confidence.

He asserted that the claimants had brought the suit against him to block his attempts at “whistle-blowing” the trio’s alleged wrongdoings.

These alleged unlawful acts included misadministration of the estate as well as an alleged property tax evasion scheme by falsely obtaining owner-occupier tax relief on a property.

Justice Tan rejected these arguments.

The judge said Mr Ramachandra’s assertions were unsubstantiated and that the exception applied only to legal professional privilege.

Justice Tan added that he found Mr Ramachandra to be “shrewd and untrustworthy”, and concluded that there was a high risk that the defendant would destroy the relevant evidence.

“In particular, his admission to tampering with documents to suit his legal agenda showed that he had manipulated the evidence of how he had unlawfully obtained the confidential material,” said the judge.

Mr G. P. Selvam, who died on Oct 23, 2022, has been described as a “legendary admiralty lawyer”.

He was elevated to the bench in 1991 as judicial commissioner, and later appointed as a Judge of the Supreme Court, a role he held until his retirement in 2001.

He was chairman of the Committee of Inquiry that was convened to look into the cause of the riot that broke out in Little India on the night of Dec 8, 2013.

Mrs Selvam is managing director of boutique corporate and disputes firm Selvam as well as Duane Morris & Selvam, a joint venture between Selvam and US law firm Duane Morris.

She has two daughters, Ms Priya Pannirselvam and Ms Roshni Ranjani Pannirselvam. Mr Ramachandra is Ms Priya Pannirselvam’s son.

The dispute relates to the drafting and execution of Mr Selvam’s last will, dated Jan 8, 2021.

There was a previous will signed by Mr Selvam on June 21, 2017.

On Jan 3, 2025, Mr Ramachandra sent a letter through his lawyers at the time to Mrs Selvam’s law firms, requesting certain documents relating to his grandfather’s estate.

Later that month, on Jan 20, Mr Ramachandra’s then-lawyers sent another letter to the attention of Mrs Selvam and her daughters.

It was titled “Trustee’s breach of fiduciary duties owed to beneficiaries of the estate”.

This letter was allegedly distributed to various parties, including people who had no direct interest under the estate or the last will.

On Feb 3, 2025, Mrs Selvam and her two daughters filed a High Court lawsuit against Mr Ramachandra for breach of confidence and defamation.

The three claimants alleged that the Jan 20 letter referred to or reproduced the text of documents and correspondence that were personal, confidential, private or privileged.

On the same day, the trio, who are represented by Senior Counsel Blossom Hing, applied for interlocutory court orders against Mr Ramachandra.

It was an ex parte application, meaning it was made without the other party being notified.

On Feb 5, Justice Tan granted injunctions to restrain Mr Ramachandra from disclosing the confidential material and from publishing the Jan 20 letter.

He also granted an order for Mr Ramachandra’s premises and personal devices to be searched for a list of confidential matters.

Mr Ramachandra was also ordered to hand over all the confidential material and to swear an affidavit disclosing the location of the confidential material.

The information included materials that Mr Ramachandra obtained from WhatsApp chatlogs on his mother’s mobile phone and a letter related to estate planning written by Mrs Selvam, intended to be passed to her daughters upon her death.

After the search was carried out, the trio learnt that he had also obtained a private letter Mrs Selvam had penned to her late husband and audio recordings of family conversations.

In seeking the orders, the claimants contended that they did not give consent to Mr Ramachandra to access or use the confidential material, and he has thus obtained the material in an unlawful or unauthorised manner.

Mr Ramachandra later applied to set aside the orders.

He argued that his mother granted him access to the material when she handed him her unlocked mobile phone.

He also contended that there was insufficient basis for granting the orders.

In dismissing Mr Ramachandra’s bid, Justice Tan found that the material was clearly private or personal and recognised as confidential and worthy of protection.

He noted that after the search order was carried out, the claimants discovered that Mr Ramachandra had obtained private communications between his mother and her financial advisers, friends, and psychologist.

Justice Tan said Mr Ramachandra’s mother had allowed him to use her phone only for the limited purpose of sending photographs to himself, and that she did not give him carte blanche to access and forward the confidential material to himself.

The judge also noted two instances in which Mr Ramachandra had tampered with documents.

In one instance, Mr Ramachandra added a date in the purported copy of Mrs Selvam’s letter to her daughters.

He claimed he had done this to provide “context” that the letter pertained to how Mrs Selvam was involved in drafting Mr Selvam’s last will.

Arfat Pannir Selvam and others v Sharad Selvam Ramachandra [2026] SGHC 56

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