Family Law

Child Maintenance in Pakistan: The Father's Duty and How Karachi Family Courts Enforce It

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When parents separate, the children's day-to-day costs usually fall on the parent the children live with, which in Karachi is most often the mother. Pakistani law places that cost on the father. The children have their own claim, made in their own name, and it does not depend on who has custody or on how the mother's own claim is going. Mothers searching for the best family lawyer in Karachi for child maintenance usually need that one point settled first, because it changes how the whole case is planned. This guide explains the duty, how to file, how the court fixes the amount, and what happens when the father does not pay or lives abroad.

The father's duty: how long it lasts and what it covers

Under Muslim law as applied by the courts in Pakistan, the father must maintain his son until the son attains majority and his daughter until she is married. The High Court of Sindh restated this in Lashkar Ali v. Mst. Azizan Khatoon (C.P. No. S-111 of 2023, Sukkur, 10 July 2023), and decrees in Sindh are commonly framed to run until the child reaches majority. Read the wording of your own decree carefully: some older decrees use “puberty”, and the exact words decide when payments stop.

Maintenance is wider than food and clothes. In Humayun Hassan v. Arslan Humayun (PLD 2013 SC 557) the Supreme Court held that it is not confined to food, clothing and lodging, and Sindh courts rely on that case to include schooling, medical care and the ordinary comforts of the family's station in life. A two-member Supreme Court bench in 2025 (as reported in the press) described the conditions: the child is in need and cannot earn because of age or incapacity, and the father has the means or the capacity to earn.

That last point matters in practice. A father's claim that he is unemployed or earns little is not, by itself, an answer. The Supreme Court in the same 2025 decision said unemployment without a genuine physical or mental disability is not a valid excuse, and the High Court of Sindh has said that an able-bodied father must work to meet the obligation (Naveed Akhtar v. XXI Family Judge South Karachi, C.P. No. S-84 of 2023). Only where the father genuinely cannot pay may the duty shift to a mother of means or to the paternal grandfather. In August 2026 the Supreme Court also directed courts, in such cases, to consider referring the child to Pakistan Bait-ul-Mal rather than simply closing the claim (Pakistan Bait-ul-Mal v. Raj Ram, C.M.A. 1477 of 2023, as reported).

Separate from custody, from the mother's claim and from remarriage

Three things that fathers often raise do not end the children's claim.

• Custody. The children living with their mother is the usual situation, not a defence. In Hina Batool v. Syed Asad Abbas (C.P. No. S-418 of 2020, decided November 2025) the High Court of Sindh said a father “cannot be absolved of this burden under any circumstances”. If he says he is being denied access, his remedy is an application in the custody or visitation case, not stopping payment. See our guide to child custody in the Guardian Courts.
• The mother's own claim. The wife's maintenance and the children's maintenance are separate. In Arsalan Aijaz v. Mst. Sanobar (C.P. No. S-28 of 2019, Hyderabad, 2020) the wife's claim failed but each child's maintenance was decreed and later increased. Her own rights are covered in our guide to wife maintenance (nafqa).
• The mother's remarriage. Remarriage does not transfer the father's duty to the stepfather. It may be raised in the custody case, where the court looks at the child's welfare, but the father remains liable to maintain his child while that child is entitled.

Children from different marriages are treated alike. In Hina Batool the court required the father to maintain the child in Karachi on a footing comparable to his other children living in the United Kingdom.

Filing in the Family Court in Karachi

Maintenance is one of the matters listed in Part I of the Schedule to the West Pakistan Family Courts Act, 1964, so the claim goes to the Family Court, not a civil court. The suit is brought in the child's name, normally by the mother as the person looking after the child. Under rule 6 of the West Pakistan Family Court Rules, 1965 it can be filed where the cause of action arose or where the parties reside or last resided together; in practice that is usually the Family Court of the Karachi district where the children live.

The child's claim can be filed alone or joined with other claims. The proviso to section 7(2) of the Act allows a plaint for dissolution of marriage (including khula) to contain claims for maintenance, dower, dowry, personal belongings, custody and visitation, so a mother filing for khula need not file a second suit for the children.

One Sindh point: the Arbitration Council route under section 9 of the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance, 1961 is for a wife's maintenance. Punjab added a separate child-maintenance route, section 9(1A), by its own 2015 amendment, and that amendment is Punjab law only. In Karachi the child's claim belongs in the Family Court.

Collect these before you see a lawyer:

• the Nikahnama, and both parents' CNICs;
• each child's birth certificate or B-Form;
• school admission letters and fee vouchers, and receipts for tuition, transport and uniforms;
• medical records and pharmacy bills, especially for any ongoing condition;
• anything showing the father's income or assets: salary slips, employer name, business or shop details, property, vehicles, foreign employment;
• a dated record of what he has paid and when he stopped, with messages or bank transfers.

Interim maintenance under section 17-A

A full trial takes months, and children cannot wait. Section 17-A of the Family Courts Act, inserted by Ordinance LV of 2002, reads in the form reproduced by the High Court of Sindh in Lashkar Ali: “At any stage of proceedings in a suit for maintenance, the Family Court may pass an interim order for maintenance whereunder the payment shall be made by the fourteenth of each month, failing which the Court may strike off the defence of the defendant and decree the suit.”

Sindh courts treat this as something to be decided early. In Muhammad Ghufran Haque v. Mst. Nazia Akbar (C.P. No. S-1152 of 2025, 24 October 2025) the High Court described the Family Court as bound to fix interim maintenance on the defendant's first date of appearance, and upheld an interim order against a father working in Austria. Points to know:

• The interim figure is tentative. It can be revised, and it does not decide the final amount.
• No appeal or revision lies against an interim order (section 14(3)). Constitutional petitions against such orders are usually dismissed.
• Striking off the defence is not the only consequence. In Sultan v. Hina Shaikh (C.P. No. S-67 of 2026, 11 May 2026) the High Court held that section 17-A does not limit the Family Court's authority to enforce its own interim orders, and left in place orders attaching the father's salary.

Be careful with material from Punjab. Punjab replaced section 17-A in 2015 with different wording; the version above is the one Sindh courts apply.

How the court fixes the amount

There is no formula, and no fixed share of income. The court looks at the child's reasonable needs and the father's means, status and other obligations. The Supreme Court in Tauqeer Ahmad Qureshi v. Additional District Judge, Lahore (PLD 2009 SC 760) required the father's status and financial condition to be considered, and in a petition decided in 2026 it refused to disturb a Sindh award fixed after weighing the father's income abroad and his support for children from an earlier marriage.

What the court weighs	Evidence that helps
Schooling	Admission letter, fee vouchers, transport and tuition receipts. In Hina Batool the mother's choice of school was upheld as being in the child's best interests.
Health	Prescriptions, hospital records, a doctor's note on continuing treatment. A Hyderabad court enhanced maintenance on medical grounds in C.P. No. S-819 of 2015.
Father's real income	Salary slips, employer details, business premises, property and vehicles, lifestyle evidence. In the same case a court commission found the father “a well to do person” despite his low declared income.
Family's standard of living	Where the child lived and studied before the separation.

A bare statement that the father earns little does not discharge him. The High Court of Sindh said so in Arsalan Aijaz and in Mst. Lubna Shamshad Ali v. Dilshad Ali (C.P. No. S-236 of 2019, Sukkur, 2021), where an appellate reduction was set aside because neither side had proved the father's finances.

Arrears, the starting date and annual increases

From when? Most Sindh decrees run from the date the suit was filed, and arrears for the period of the case are calculated from that date, with credit for anything paid under the interim order. Courts have sometimes gone further back where the evidence supported it: in Lubna Shamshad Ali the restored decree ran from a stated month before trial. For a wife, the Supreme Court held in Muhammad Aslam Chattha v. Shehnaz Akhtar (C.A. No. 1413 of 2021, November 2025) that each month of non-payment is a fresh cause of action and allowed past maintenance going back many years. How far back a child's claim will reach is decided on the facts, so file promptly and keep proof of when support stopped.

Annual increases. Sindh has no automatic increase. The rule that maintenance rises by ten per cent a year unless the court says otherwise comes from section 17-A(3) as substituted by the Punjab Family Courts (Amendment) Act, 2015, and applies in Punjab only. In Sindh, any increase must be written into the decree. Courts here routinely do so, at rates such as ten per cent (Hina Batool), fifteen per cent (left undisturbed by the Supreme Court in 2026) or twenty per cent (Arsalan Aijaz), but the Supreme Court has also cut an unjustified twenty per cent rate to five per cent (Tauqeer Ahmad Qureshi). Ask for an increase in the plaint and support it with evidence.

Changed circumstances. If costs rise sharply, for example a new school or a medical condition, a fresh suit for enhancement can be filed; the High Court of Sindh has confirmed there is no bar to it.

Enforcement, and when the father lives abroad

If he does not pay, the mother files an execution application before the Family Court. Under section 13(3) of the Act, a money decree not paid within the time fixed may, if the court so directs, be recovered as arrears of land revenue. Execution courts in Sindh also attach salary through the employer (in one Karachi execution, C.P. No. S-448 of 2022, half the judgment-debtor's salary was attached and deposited by his employer), attach property, and allow arrears to be paid in instalments against security. Detention in civil prison is possible but not automatic: in Salman Bari v. Mst. Samia Khan (C.P. No. S-02 of 2021) the High Court held that it requires notice to show cause, an inquiry and recorded reasons, such as ability to pay coupled with refusal. Sindh orders have not been uniform on how far the Civil Procedure Code applies in family execution, which is one reason the same default can be handled differently in different courts.

A father abroad raises three separate issues:

• Service. Serve him at his actual foreign address as well as any Pakistani address. In Nofil Nawaz Mulkana v. Sana Maqbool (C.P. No. S-849 of 2017) an ex parte decree against a husband in Denmark was set aside because no attempt had been made to serve him at his known Copenhagen address.
• Enforcement abroad. Pakistan acceded to the UN Convention on the Recovery Abroad of Maintenance, 1956 on 14 July 1959, and the United Kingdom is also a party. In Hina Batool the Pakistan Mission lodged a complaint with the UK Child Maintenance Service, and the court was told the Solicitor General had been designated the transmitting agency. The UAE, Saudi Arabia, the United States and Canada are not listed as parties, so recovery there is harder and usually rests on assets in Pakistan.
• Travel documents. In Hina Batool the High Court ordered the father's CNIC and passport blocked until arrears were cleared. That was an order of the High Court on strong facts, not a routine Family Court step. Putting someone on the Exit Control List is a Federal Government power under section 2 of the Exit from Pakistan (Control) Ordinance, 1981, and we are not aware of settled authority that a Family Court may order it for maintenance arrears. Treat it as uncertain.

More on these practical problems is in our guide for women whose husbands live abroad.

Children of Hindu and Christian parents

The Family Courts Act is a procedural statute and its forum is open to non-Muslim families. In Chander v. Shirimati Hemi (C.P. No. S-682 of 2016, Hyderabad, 2022) the marriage had been solemnised under Hindu law; the Family Court at Pithoro decreed the wife's suit, the executing court directed monthly maintenance for the minors alongside payment of the decree in instalments against security, and the High Court dismissed the father's challenge. The source of the father's duty, and some details such as how long it lasts, come from the family's own personal law, so the plaint should be drafted on that basis. See our page on Hindu and Christian family law.

Common questions

This article is general information about Pakistani law and procedure, not legal advice for any specific matter. If this touches on something you're currently facing, get in touch and we'll advise on your facts directly.