On 16 December 2025, the Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, brought to a close a decades-old family property dispute that had started in 1992. The case involved the interplay between customary law and Islamic Shariah.
The litigation centred on whether property inherited under customary law could later be subjected to the principles of Shariah following statutory developments. After being contested before the Civil Court and the first appellate court, the matter reached the High Court as a Civil Revision Application in 2013.
Appearing for the successful party, Ch. Imran Hassan Ali, Advocate, advanced the pivotal legal submission that the Shariah Application Act could not be applied retrospectively to property that had already vested in his client under customary law prior to the Act’s enforcement. The Court accepted this contention, holding that inheritance governed by customary law before the statutory shift could not be reopened on the basis of subsequently applicable Shariah principles.
Allowing the revision application, the High Court set aside the judgment of the Additional District Judge, thereby restoring the rights accrued under customary law and conclusively resolving the long-running dispute.