On Tuesday (May 27), Pakistan’s top Islamic body rejected a bill attempting to criminalize child marriages in Islamabad, describing it as “non-Islam.”
The Islamic Ideology Council (CII) has declared a similar bill when the Kybar Pakhtankwa (KP) state government will face conflict with Sharia (Islamic law). The announcement came on Tuesday (May 27) in a statement issued after a CII meeting chaired by Dr. Raguhib Hussein Naemi of the federal capital, Islamabad.
The CII discussed the anti-child marriage bill passed in Parliament on May 16th and passed in the Senate on May 19th. The bill defines children as people under the age of 18 of any gender, and if any of the individuals are under the age of 18, the Nika (Islamic marriage) registrar (judicial) is not permitted to strictly adhere to marriage.
Registrars must also verify and verify the age of both parties using a national database and a computerized national ID card (CNIC) issued by the Registration Agency (NADRA).
According to the law, if the registrar violates this law, they can face a prison for up to one year and a fine of 100,000 Pakistani Rupees (USD 354). The bill says men over the age of 18 who marry a minor girl could face tough imprisonment for up to three years.
“Living with a child under the age of 18 in a marital relationship is considered statutory rape,” the bill states.
The CII argued that provisions in the bill that define marriage under the age of 18 as a punishment for sexual assault and prescription are not consistent with Islamic injunctions. The Parliament’s standing committee added that it had not referred the bill to the CII for review before approving the vote.
The CII also discovered Child Marriage Confinement Bill 2025, which the KP State Government submitted for conflict with Sharia.
Islamic teaching emphasized that testing for thalassemia blood disorders before marriage is not essential, and not essential.
Christian Daily Daily-Morning Star News reached out to CII Chairman Naeemi for comment, but he was not available.
The bill passed in both chambers of both Houses of Congress has not yet been signed by President Asif Zardari. Once the law is signed, it applies only to Islamabad, and only the district and session courts will handle the relevant cases. The Child Marriage Binding Act of 1929 no longer applies to federal capitals after the enforcement of the law, but all previous orders, decisions and judgments made under that law are still considered valid.
Christian socio-political leaders praise the legislation for passing by Congress, calling it a revolutionary step for the protection of children, especially girls, in terms of health, education and life.
“The law is also important to protect minor Christian girls from the tragedy of forced faith conversion, as perpetrators misuse religion to acquiesce and marry minor girls,” Ejaz Alam Augustine, a Christian parliament member of Punjab Congress, previously told Christian Daily International Morning Star News.
The law emphasizes that anyone who enforces a child can be jailed for up to seven years and fined up to 1 million Pakistani rupee (USD 3,540).
“The same punishment applies to those involved in child trafficking for the purposes of marriage.”
The bill also criminalized Abetta and his accomplices, saying, “People who support arranging child marriages could be sentenced to up to three years in prison and could be fined.”
It also states that parents or guardians who do not stop at marriage with or are involved in marriage with children may also face severe prison terms and fines of up to three years.
According to the law, courts have the power to stop child marriages if notified in time, and the law also guarantees protection for whistleblowers who wish to remain anonymous.
The new law will also deny bail to the perpetrator of a minor marriage crime and will detain the court to complete the trial within 90 days.
Augustine is seeking a similar bill that has been introduced in the Punjab Parliament for over a year to be presented for the vote. Pending in Punjab Parliament since April 25, 2024, the bill aims to increase the legal age of marriages for both sexes by 18 years in Punjab.
With approval of the bill pending, the minimum age for a girl to marry is only 16 in Punjab. Nationally, the Christian Marriage (Amendment) Act 2024 set the age of marriage to 18 for Christians only. If they convert to Islam, the girl thinks Muslims will come under Sharia, so they allow them to marry young.
Usually, a tempted girl in Pakistan is accused of young people as young as 10 years old, converted to Islam, raped under a hidden gem of Islamic “marriage” and pressured to record false statements in favour of the temptator, rights advocates say. The judge routinely ignores documentary evidence related to the age of a child and returns the temptation to the temptation as a “legal wife.”
Pakistan, a Muslim with a population of 96%, ranked 8th on the 2025 World Watchlist, the hardest place to become a Christian.
