Rawalpindi:
A case filed by a Chinese woman seeking the divorce (Khula) of her Pakistani husband took a new turn after contradictory decisions of the High Court and a lower court, raising if she can legally obtain Khula in Pakistan, who will obtain custody of their 12 -year -old daughter, and if the woman will be granted to a visa to stay in the country until the question is resolved.
According to court documents, Chinese national Mir Guli married Shah Zeb, a Charsadda trader, in China, in 2011. A year later, she gave birth to a girl, Sofia. Mir Guli says that her husband, without informing her, recorded Sofia’s file with Nadra in Pakistan, effectively dismissing her Chinese nationality, but did not record Mir Guli as his wife. Available by the behavior of her husband, she asked Khula before a court of the Pakistani family.
His lawyer, the lawyer for the Supreme Court, Saeed Yousaf Khan, said that the case had taken a major turn when the Shah Zeb’s legal team argued before the family court that the marriage took place in China and was registered, the Pakistani courts lacked jurisdiction to decide the question.
However, judge Sajid Mehmood Sethi of the Rawalpindi bench of the High Court of Lahore judged that the case could indeed be heard and decided in Pakistan where the wife resides. The judge ordered the lower court to hear the question on a daily basis, keeping the woman’s visa status in view, and asked for the visa section of the Ministry of the Interior to review his case.
Despite this, the judge of the Taimoor Afzal family court rejected the Khula of Mir Guli’s plea for jurisdictional reasons on the same day, the High Court declared the eligible affair. An appeal has now been filed before the sessions judge, as well as a separate request for the custody of Sofia, 12, who currently lives with her father.
