Lahore High Court has decided that a marriage entered into under Islamic Law is valid a marriage concluded after achieving puberty, even if the individual is below the age set in the law on the law of child marriage, 1929.
Justice Tariq Mahmood Bajwa made the decision while rejecting a petition filed by a father seeking to recover his 15-year-old daughter. The father claimed that his daughter aged 15 years and 8 months were in the illegal custody of Mudassar Ali and his family.
Previously, police reported that they could not recover her, but she was produced in court during the recent hearing. The girl told the court that she was not detained, had reached puberty and had married Ali of her choice. She also said she would live with her husband.
The court noted that there was no evidence of her claim of puberty. The father’s lawyer claimed that a female under 16 under 16 is a child under section 2 (a) of the law on children’s marriage.
However, the Court investigated the history of the law and noted that it was adopted under British government to limit marriages of children, but did not cause such marriages to be invalid. Later amendments that raised the legal age, invalid not marriages below this age.
LHC, which refers to the federal Shariat Court’s decision in Farooq Omar Bhoja against the Federation of Pakistan, observed that although the state can set a minimum marriage age, marriages under this threshold are not automatically invalid.
According to Islamic Law, the Court explained that two conditions control marriage: sound mind and obtaining puberty. Puberty is a biological milestone that can be proven with evidence but which is generally assumed at the age of 15. Previously obtaining is also recognized.
With reference to DF Mulla’s principles of Mohammedan law, the court said that when the girl was 15 years and 8 months and confirmed her maturity, she was legally competent to marry.
The court concluded that Islamic scholars recognize puberty as the transition from childhood to adult age. Based on this, the petition was rejected and the girl’s desire to stay with her husband was maintained.
