Pakistan does have Sharia law, but it operates inside a hybrid legal system that also carries forward British common law. Islamic law reaches deepest into family matters, inheritance, parts of the criminal code, and a constitutionally mandated move toward interest-free banking. How much it governs a particular person or dispute depends on the legal area and, for personal matters, on whether the individual is Muslim.
The Constitutional Basis
Sharia’s role is written into the top of Pakistan’s legal hierarchy. The Objectives Resolution, adopted in 1949 and later folded into the constitution as a binding provision, declares that sovereignty belongs to Allah and that state authority is a sacred trust.1The Constitution of Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan – Annex – The Objectives Resolution Article 2-A makes those principles enforceable, requiring that Muslims be enabled to order their lives according to the Quran and Sunnah.2National Assembly of Pakistan. The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan
The clause that does the practical work is Article 227, sometimes called the Repugnancy Clause. It requires that all existing laws be brought into conformity with Islamic injunctions and forbids any new law that contradicts them.3The Constitution of Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan Part IX – Islamic Provisions For matters of personal law, the Quran and Sunnah are applied as interpreted by each Muslim sect, so Sunni and Shia communities can follow different jurisprudential traditions within the same national framework.
The Court That Enforces It
The Federal Shariat Court, created under Articles 203-A through 203-J, can examine any law on its own initiative or through a petition and declare it repugnant to Islamic injunctions. When it does, the relevant government must amend the law, and the offending provisions eventually cease to have effect.4The Constitution of Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan Part VII Chapter 3A – Federal Shariat Court The court has used that power to reshape banking, criminal sentencing, and property law over the decades.
Its jurisdiction is bounded. It cannot review the constitution itself, Muslim personal law handled by family courts, or court procedural rules, and fiscal and banking laws were exempted for a defined period. Up to eight Muslim judges sit on the court, appointed by the President, with up to four drawn from the High Court bench and up to three who are ulema with at least fifteen years of experience in Islamic law.4The Constitution of Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan Part VII Chapter 3A – Federal Shariat Court Appeals go to a Shariat Appellate Bench of three Muslim Supreme Court justices.5The Constitution of Pakistan. Constitution of Pakistan – Chapter 3A – Shariat Bench of Superior Courts
Family Law for Muslims
Family law is where Sharia most directly governs daily life for Pakistan’s Muslim majority, codified largely through the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance of 1961.
Marriage and the Nikahnama
Muslim marriages are contractual. Every marriage is recorded on a standardized document, the nikahnama, which serves as both religious contract and legal registration.6Centre for Economic Research in Pakistan. Women’s Rights and the Nikah Nama in Pakistan It records the mahr (dower) owed from husband to wife, which is a mandatory requirement for a valid marriage and can be paid immediately or deferred. It also records whether the wife has been delegated the right to initiate divorce, a clause that matters greatly if the marriage later breaks down.
Polygamy
A husband seeking an additional wife must apply to the local Arbitration Council for written permission, state his reasons, and disclose whether the existing wife consents. Permission is granted only if the Council finds the proposed marriage necessary and just. Marrying without permission makes the entire dower owed to the existing wife immediately payable and exposes the husband to up to one year of imprisonment, a fine, or both.
Divorce
Under Section 7 of the Ordinance, the spouse initiating divorce sends written notice to the Chairman of the local Union Council. The divorce becomes effective only after a 90-day waiting period during which the Council is meant to attempt reconciliation, and it can be revoked at any point before the period expires.7Voicepk.net. Supreme Court Affirms Wife’s Right to Revoke Delegated Divorce Within 90 Days A wife can use the same process directly if her nikahnama delegated her that right.
Child Custody
Custody follows the Islamic concept of hizanat, which gives the mother a presumptive right to physical custody of young children. Under the Hanafi school followed by most Pakistani Sunnis, the mother keeps custody of a son until age seven and a daughter until puberty. Shia jurisprudence sets a son at age two (when weaned) and a daughter at age seven.8Library of Congress. Pakistan – International Child Custody These are defaults. Pakistani courts have deviated from them when the best interest of the child requires, and a mother can lose hizanat if she marries someone outside a prohibited degree of kinship to the child.
Inheritance
Estate distribution follows faraid, the Islamic system of fixed shares. Twelve classes of relatives qualify as sharers with Quranically prescribed portions, including children, parents, and spouses. Residue passes to the nearest male relatives (asaba). A person can leave a will, but Islamic law caps bequests at one-third of the estate; the remaining two-thirds must follow the fixed shares. Testamentary freedom is far narrower than in common law jurisdictions and cannot be easily worked around.
What About Non-Muslims
Sharia does not govern the personal affairs of Pakistan’s religious minorities. Christians follow the Christian Marriage Act of 1872 and the Christian Divorce Act of 1869. Parsis follow the Parsi Marriage and Divorce Act of 1936. Hindus, long without a dedicated statute, gained the Hindu Marriage Act in 2017, which sets conditions for marriage, requires registration within fifteen days, and establishes minimum ages.9Shaikh Ahmad Hassan School of Law. The Hindu Marriage Act 2017 – A Review
The exemption is narrow. Non-Muslims remain fully subject to Pakistan’s criminal laws, including the Hudood Ordinances and blasphemy provisions. The personal-law carve-out reaches family matters only, and the separate statutes are often less developed than the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance, leaving minority communities with fewer procedural protections in practice.
Sharia in the Criminal Code
The Hudood Ordinances
The Hudood Ordinances of 1979 introduced religiously derived offenses and punishments that run parallel to the inherited Pakistan Penal Code. Punishments split into two categories: hadd, the fixed punishments ordained by the Quran or Sunnah, and tazir, discretionary punishments a court can impose when the hadd standard of proof is not met.10Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Law Department. The Offence of Zina (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance The hadd bar is deliberately extreme, requiring eyewitness testimony from multiple adult Muslim witnesses of high moral character, so most cases proceed under the lower tazir standard with conventional evidence rules.
The Ordinances also criminalize false accusations of adultery through the offense of qazf. A conviction at the hadd level carries 80 lashes and renders the person’s testimony inadmissible in any court going forward.11The Constitution of Pakistan. The Offence of Qazf (Enforcement of Hadd) Ordinance, 1979 The Protection of Women (Criminal Laws Amendment) Act of 2006 shifted several categories of sexual offenses from the Federal Shariat Court to regular criminal courts and modified the evidentiary framework, responding to criticism that the original scheme punished victims who could not meet hadd proof.
Qisas and Diyat
Offenses against the human body, including murder and serious physical injury, are governed by an Islamic framework of qisas (retaliation) and diyat (blood money) codified in Chapter XVI of the Pakistan Penal Code. Qisas allows the victim or their family to seek punishment equivalent to the harm. Diyat allows the offender to pay compensation to the victim’s heirs in exchange for a pardon. The government sets the diyat amount annually based on the market price of silver, and a 2025 amendment raised the floor to 45,000 grams of silver, with the rupee value tracking silver prices.
The system gives the victim’s family effective veto power over criminal punishment in many homicide cases. Critics say it lets wealthy offenders buy their way out; supporters view it as restorative justice grounded in Islamic tradition. Pakistani courts have narrowed the dynamic by treating certain killings, such as those involving terrorism or public interest, as non-compoundable, so the state can prosecute even if the family pardons.
Blasphemy
Sections 295 through 298 of the Pakistan Penal Code cover blasphemy. Section 295-B prescribes life imprisonment for defiling a copy of the Quran. Section 295-C addresses derogatory remarks about the Prophet Muhammad and originally allowed either death or life imprisonment; since 1991, following a Federal Shariat Court ruling, the death penalty has been the mandatory sentence on conviction. Section 298 covers deliberately wounding religious feelings and carries up to one year of imprisonment. Additional subsections target specific communities, including provisions restricting members of the Ahmadiyya community from using certain Islamic titles or terminology. No execution under the blasphemy laws has been carried out by the state, but accusations alone frequently lead to mob violence, and defendants can spend years in prison awaiting trial.
Interest-Free Banking by 2028
Islamic law prohibits riba, generally understood as interest on loans. The Federal Shariat Court has repeatedly directed the government to eliminate interest from the financial system, and its April 2022 judgment set the end of 2027 as the deadline. The 26th Constitutional Amendment in 2024 went further, rewriting Article 38(f) to require the complete elimination of riba before January 1, 2028. This lifts the mandate from a court order to an explicit constitutional command. The State Bank of Pakistan has been expanding the Islamic banking sector as a parallel system, offering Sharia-compliant alternatives that use profit-sharing, leasing, and asset-backed structures.12State Bank of Pakistan. FAQs on Islamic Banking
Whether Pakistan can convert its entire banking system by the 2028 deadline is an open question. Its existing financial infrastructure is deeply tied to conventional interest-based instruments, including government bonds and international lending agreements. Full implementation would be one of the most ambitious applications of Sharia to modern economic governance anywhere in the world.