![[07/09, 9:05 pm] Advocate Fahad Ahmad Siddiqi: اگر نابالغ کا باپ یا دادا اسکا نام ونفقہ ادا کرنے کی بالکل استطاعت نہ رکھ...](https://img4.lawfirms1.com/642/466/1590811076424660.jpg)
26/09/2026
[07/09, 9:05 pm] Advocate Fahad Ahmad Siddiqi: اگر نابالغ کا باپ یا دادا اسکا نام ونفقہ ادا کرنے کی بالکل استطاعت نہ رکھتا ہو تو عدالت کو کیا کرنا چاہیے؟
سپریم کورٹ نے ہدایات جاری کی ہیں کہ مناسب طریقہ یہ ہوگا کہ متعلقہ شخص کا معاملہ غور کے لیے بیت المال کو بھیج دیا جائے۔ اس کے بعد بیت المال اپنی قابل اطلاق پالیسی اور اہلیت کے معیار کے مطابق درخواست دہندہ کے حالات کا جائزہ لے سکتا ہے، اور مناسب امداد کی حد کا تعین کر سکتا ہے
Accordingly, for future cases, where circumstances disclosed before a Court appear to warrant recourse to Bait-ul-Mal, the appropriate course would be to refer the case of the person concerned to Bait-ul-Mal for consideration. Bait-ul-Mal may thereafter facilitate the making of the necessary application, assess the circumstances of the applicant in accordance with the applicable policy and eligibility criteria, and determine the form and extent of assistance appropriate to the particular case. This course allows a Court to bring a deserving case within the reach of the welfare institution established to respond to it, without displacing the framework through which that institution is required to administer its assistance.
C.M.A.1477/2023
Pakistan Bait ul Mal Thr. Managing Director. Islamabad v. Raj Ram and others
Mr. Justice Yahya Afridi
24-08-2026
[08/09, 10:25 pm] Advocate Fahad Ahmad Siddiqi: Continuing Parenthood
A Justice System Built Around the Child
My forthcoming book ...."Continuing Parenthood" begins with a simple but important premise:
"when a family separates, the legal consequences do not end with the relationship between the adults. The child’s life is also reorganised".
The book contains around 80 chapters across 12 parts. The first 35 chapters take the reader from children’s rights, human dignity and the best interests of the child, through parental relationships, responsibility and separation, to custody and care, access and contact, and ultimately the child’s voice and participation.
A central concern of the book is the need to distinguish the different legal dimensions of a child’s life.
Custody principally concerns the child’s physical care and principal residence. The parent with whom the child lives will ordinarily carry the greater burden of daily care and practical responsibility. But custody should not become an answer to every other question concerning the child.
Residence, care, guardianship, parental responsibility and contact perform different legal functions. They may operate together in practice, but they should remain distinguishable in law. As the book argues, “custody should not be allowed to perform the work of every other legal category.”
Calling one parent “custodial” does not, by that label alone, transfer every form of parental authority to that parent or reduce the non-custodial parent to a visitor. Equally, recognising these distinctions does not mean that equal or shared custody must follow in every case. One parent may provide the principal home while the other continues to have meaningful responsibilities & association with the child. Where the child’s welfare requires it, that involvement may appropriately be limited.
The purpose is not to manufacture symmetry between parents. It is to prevent one legal determination from silently deciding all the others.
The same child-centered approach informs the book’s treatment of mediation in the Pakistani family context. Mediation should not merely be a mechanism for bringing adults to a settlement. In family disputes, particularly where children are involved, it can provide space for parents and families to move away from positional conflict and consider how relationships can continue after separation. A Pakistani approach to mediation may draw upon reconciliation, family participation and community realities, while remaining firmly guided by the child’s welfare. The objective is not simply to settle the case, but, where possible, to preserve workable parental relationships beyond the courtroom.
The child is not merely the subject of the dispute. The child is the person whose life the law is reorganising.
And that is why the measure of justice cannot end with whether a case was heard or an order was passed.
In the end, a child should feel that the court was built with their welfare in mind, not simply that their case was heard
