This article is general information about domestic violence law in Punjab, not legal advice. If you are in immediate danger, contact the police on 15 or the Punjab Women's Helpline on 1043.
Domestic violence law in Pakistan is not contained in a single federal statute. Protection against domestic violence is a provincial subject, and if you or someone in your family lives in Punjab, the law that matters most is the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016. Alongside it, criminal acts committed within a domestic relationship (assault, threats, confinement) are prosecuted under the Pakistan Penal Code regardless of which province you are in. A third route sits alongside both: family law. Khula, maintenance and custody proceedings can run at the same time as a protection order or a criminal case. None of these routes cancel out the others, and you do not have to choose only one.
Domestic violence law in Pakistan: provincial, not one federal act
Pakistan does not have one national domestic violence law that applies uniformly across the country. After the 18th Constitutional Amendment, family and social welfare matters, including protection from domestic violence, became a provincial responsibility. Each province has passed its own legislation, on its own timeline, with its own definitions and remedies.
In Punjab, the relevant law is the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016. It sets up a civil, protective route: you can apply to the court for a protection order, a residence order or a monetary order without first having to prove a criminal case. The Act exists to stop violence and manage safety, not to punish; punishment for criminal acts is handled separately under the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).
This distinction matters day to day. A woman experiencing violence in Punjab is not limited to filing a police report and waiting for a criminal trial. She can go to the court for protective orders that address her immediate safety and living situation, while a criminal complaint proceeds in parallel if the conduct also amounts to an offence under the PPC. The two systems serve different purposes: one manages risk and daily life, the other establishes guilt and punishment.
If you are unsure which province's law applies to your situation, the deciding factor is generally where you live or where the violence took place, not where you were married or where your husband's family is based. A family lawyer in Lahore can confirm which route fits your facts before you file anything.
What counts as domestic violence under the Punjab Act
The Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016 defines domestic violence broadly. It is not limited to physical assault. The Act recognises several categories of harm, and you do not need to have suffered all of them to have a case.
Physical abuse covers hitting, slapping, choking or any act that causes bodily pain, injury or harm. This is the category most people think of first, but it is only one part of the definition.
Emotional and psychological abuse includes threats, intimidation, humiliation and controlling behaviour that damages a person's mental wellbeing. Constant verbal abuse, isolation from family and friends, and threats to harm you or your children can all fall within this category, even without a single physical mark to show for it.
Economic abuse covers denying a woman access to money, property or resources she is entitled to, or using financial control as a form of coercion. Withholding maintenance, blocking access to a joint account, or preventing a woman from working can be economic abuse under the Act.
Stalking is also addressed: repeated, unwanted following, monitoring or contact that causes fear or distress, including after a relationship or marriage has ended.
The common thread across all four categories is that the conduct occurs within a domestic relationship, meaning between people who are or were married, related by blood, or sharing a household. The Act does not require you to prove a pattern going back years. A recent, serious incident, or an established pattern of smaller incidents, can both support an application.
If you are not sure whether what you have experienced meets the legal definition, describe the specific incidents to a lawyer rather than trying to categorise them yourself first. What matters to the court is what happened, not which label you put on it.
Protection orders and what they can do
When the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016 applies, the court designated under the Act can grant three main types of order. [VERIFY WITH FIRM: current forum practice in Lahore on exactly which court hears these applications day to day]; ask your lawyer to confirm the correct forum before filing. Each order addresses a different part of the problem: contact, housing and money.
Protection orders
A protection order is the court's instruction to the person committing violence to stay away and stop the contact. It can prohibit the respondent from contacting you directly or through others, from entering your workplace or your children's school, and from coming near your residence. Breach of a protection order is treated seriously and can bring its own consequences, separate from the underlying violence.
Residence orders
A residence order deals with where you live. If you are at risk in your own home, the court can order that you keep the right to stay there, or it can direct alternative accommodation if remaining in the same house is not safe. In our experience, many women hesitate to seek help because they fear losing their home; this order exists to remove that barrier.
Monetary orders
A monetary order requires the respondent to cover expenses and losses caused by the violence. This can include medical costs, the cost of alternative accommodation, and other losses directly connected to the abuse. It is not the same as maintenance under family law, though the two can overlap, and a lawyer can advise on how to pursue both without duplicating effort.
Applications for these orders are meant to move faster than a typical civil suit, because the underlying purpose is safety, not a lengthy contest over facts. That said, the court still needs to hear both sides and consider the evidence before making an order, so treat the process as urgent rather than instant.
You can apply for more than one type of order at the same time. A woman who needs to stay in her home safely, stop contact from her husband, and recover costs she has already incurred can ask for a residence order, a protection order and a monetary order together in a single application.
The criminal route: FIR under the PPC
A protection order under the Punjab Act addresses safety and living arrangements. It does not, on its own, punish the person who committed the violence. For that, the criminal route under the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) runs alongside it.
Physical violence within a domestic relationship can amount to one of several hurt offences under the PPC, depending on the nature and severity of the injury. Threats to harm you, your children or your property can amount to criminal intimidation under section 506 PPC, which criminalises threatening someone with injury to their person, reputation or property with intent to cause alarm. Confining someone against their will, for example locking a person inside a room or the house, can amount to wrongful confinement.
To start the criminal route, you or someone on your behalf reports the incident at the local police station. If the offence is cognizable (meaning police can investigate and act without waiting for a magistrate's permission), the station house officer is required to register a First Information Report (FIR) under section 154 of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1898 without unnecessary delay. Our detailed guide on how to file an FIR in Pakistan explains the registration process step by step, including what to do if the police are reluctant to register your complaint.
In our experience, police sometimes hesitate with domestic violence complaints, treating them as a private matter rather than a crime. That is not a legal basis for refusal. If the facts describe a cognizable offence, whether hurt, criminal intimidation or wrongful confinement, the police have a duty to register the FIR. Bring any evidence you already have (medical records, photographs, messages) when you report, since this strengthens the complaint from the outset.
The criminal case and a protection order application under the 2016 Act are not mutually exclusive. Many women pursue both: the FIR addresses accountability and creates an official record, while the protection order addresses immediate safety. A criminal lawyer in Lahore can help you sequence the two so that one does not undermine the other.
The family-law route in parallel
Domestic violence rarely exists in isolation from the marriage itself, and Pakistani family law gives you routes that work alongside a protection order or a criminal case rather than instead of them.
If you want to end the marriage, cruelty is one of the recognised statutory grounds for khula, a wife's right to seek dissolution of marriage through the Family Court. Our guide on the khula procedure in Pakistan sets out the eight grounds in detail and explains how the court weighs evidence of cruelty, including the kind of documentation (medical records, witness accounts, correspondence) that also supports a domestic violence case. Evidence you gather for one proceeding is often useful in the other.
Maintenance is a separate issue from the divorce itself. Both a wife and any children are entitled to maintenance from the husband under family law, and this claim can be raised whether or not you are seeking khula. If economic abuse has been part of the pattern of violence, maintenance proceedings are one way to address the financial harm directly.
If children are involved, custody becomes relevant. Pakistani courts decide custody on the welfare of the child, not automatic parental entitlement, and a documented history of violence in the home is a factor the court will consider. Our guide to child custody in Pakistan explains how the welfare test works and what evidence matters.
These three family-law claims, khula, maintenance and custody, are usually handled together in the Family Court, sometimes in the same or connected proceedings as a domestic violence matter. A family court lawyer in Lahore can advise on how the Family Court and the protective orders under the 2016 Act interact in practice, so that filing one does not delay or complicate the other.
None of these routes require you to prove the others first. You do not need a criminal conviction to seek khula on grounds of cruelty, and you do not need to finish a khula case before applying for a protection order. Each proceeding has its own standard of proof and its own purpose.
Immediate safety and support services
If you are in danger right now, safety comes before paperwork. Two numbers are worth saving in your phone today: the Punjab Women's Helpline on 1043, which offers guidance and support specifically for women facing violence, and the police emergency number, 15, for immediate danger.
Beyond the helpline, the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016 provides for shelter through the courts and the protection committee structure set up under the Act. [VERIFY WITH FIRM: current operational detail on district Women Protection Committees and shelter access varies by district and should be confirmed before advising a client]. Generally, a court that grants a residence order can direct alternative accommodation where returning home is not safe, and shelter homes (dar-ul-aman) exist for women who need somewhere safe to stay.
If you are planning to leave an unsafe home, a few practical steps help regardless of which legal route you take. Keep copies of identity documents (your CNIC, your children's birth certificates, the nikahnama) somewhere your abuser cannot access. Tell at least one trusted person, family member or friend, where you are going and when you expect to check in. If you can, keep a record of incidents as they happen, even a simple note with the date and what occurred, since this becomes useful evidence later.
You do not have to manage all of this alone. Reaching out to the helpline, a trusted lawyer, or a family member you can rely on is a reasonable first step, and it is not a sign that you have failed to cope.
Evidence: what strengthens your case
Whichever route you take (protection order, criminal complaint or family-law claim) the strength of your case usually comes down to evidence. Courts and police work with what can be documented and corroborated, so it helps to start gathering evidence as early as it is safe to do so.
A medico-legal examination after any physical injury creates an official medical record connecting the injury to a specific date, which is far stronger evidence than a description given later without documentation. If you have been injured, seeking a medical examination promptly, even for injuries that seem minor at the time, is worth doing.
Photographs of injuries, damaged property, or the condition of your living space can support your account, particularly when taken close to the time of the incident and dated. Messages, emails or voicemails that contain threats, admissions or relevant context matter too; keep them saved in more than one place in case a device is taken or damaged.
Witnesses matter. A neighbour, family member, colleague or friend who has seen an incident, heard a threat, or observed a pattern of behaviour over time can give evidence that supports your account. You do not need many witnesses; one or two people who can speak credibly and specifically to what they observed often carry real weight.
Contemporaneous complaints, meaning telling someone (a friend, a doctor, a religious or community figure, a helpline) close to the time an incident happened, can also help establish that your account has been consistent rather than something constructed later for the proceedings. If you have already reported an incident to the police, to 1043, or to anyone else, keep a note of when and to whom.
None of this evidence needs to be perfect or complete before you seek help. Courts and lawyers work with what is available and build the case from there.
How a lawyer helps
A lawyer's first job in a domestic violence matter is not filing paperwork. It is helping you understand which of the available routes (protection order, criminal complaint, khula, or some combination) fits your situation and your priorities, whether that is safety, accountability, ending the marriage, or all three.
For urgent situations, a lawyer can prepare and file an application for a protection order quickly, and advise on what interim relief the court can grant while the fuller case is heard. If you need to leave your home, a lawyer can also help you think through the practical and legal side of a safe exit, including how maintenance and, if relevant, khula fit into the timeline.
If police are reluctant to register an FIR, a lawyer knows the correct escalation route and can push the complaint through the proper channel rather than leaving you to argue with a duty officer alone.
Throughout, a lawyer's role is to reduce the number of decisions you have to make while you are also dealing with an unsafe or frightening situation, and to make sure the routes you pursue work together rather than against each other.
Speak to a family lawyer in Lahore
If you are dealing with domestic violence and are not sure where to start, Saeed Law Firm has practised family law in Lahore since 1975 and offers a free initial consultation. We can advise on a protection order under the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016, help you report a criminal complaint, or start khula, maintenance and custody proceedings, whichever combination fits your situation. Contact us or call +92-319-4959420.
Saeed Law Firm, Y Block Main Market, Sector Y, DHA Phase 3, Lahore 54793. Phone: +92-319-4959420.