— Constitutionality of the definition of ‘child’ contained in Child Marriage Restrained Act, 1929 — Scope — Petitioner sought definition of the ‘child’ meaning a person who if a male is under 18 years of age and if a female is under 16 years of age, given in Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 be declared unconstitutional on the ground that it offended the equality clause in the Constitution — Provincial Government, in response, referred to Islamic jurisprudence regarding age of puberty as the traditional interpretative toolkit and medical science to support the notion of a female attaining puberty at an age which materially differed from a male — Held; difference in age did not necessarily lead to granting a license in the hands of a parent or guardian to marry off a female child — The nuanced concepts of puberty and age of majority were not required to be invoked here — The right question to ask was whether notwithstanding the appearance of signs of puberty differently in males and females, the Government was empowered to prescribe a minimum age for marriage or not? — For, that is what the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 sought to achieve — If this were not the case, the definition of child would have had relation to age of puberty and not ages determined reflexively or randomly — Otherwise there were no manageable standards for assigning ages of sixteen and eighteen for female and male respectively — The theme of the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 was to “restrain the solemnization of child marriage” — That purpose had been muddled by providing different ages for males and females for which there was no intelligible criteria — The definition of child in section 2(a) viz. “if a male ….and if a female is under sixteen years of age” being discriminatory and unconstitutional were held to be without lawful authority and of no legal effect — Provincial Government was directed to issue the revised version of Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929. [PLR 2025 Lahore 1 = PLD 2025 Lahore 1 = 2024 LHC 1392]

— Equality of citizens — Scope — Article 25 of the Constitution does not envisage negative equality — Such right can only be claimed when decision is taken in accordance with law — A wrong concession in favour of one person does not entitle any other person to claim benefit of a wrong decision. [2024 SCLR 26 = 2024 SCMR 145 = 2023 SCP 379]