Husband cannot reclaim dower gold as Khula compensation, LHC rules

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) has ruled that a husband is not entitled to reclaim gold ornaments listed as dower in a Nikahnama (marriage contract) as consideration for Khula (dissolution of marriage) sought by his wife.

Justice Raheel Kamran passed the judgement while disposing of four connected petitions arising from a matrimonial dispute between Dr Rukhsana Kausar and Shahid Nazeer.

Both parties had challenged the findings of a Muzaffargarh sessions court concerning gold ornaments and other matters, including maintenance, dowry and ownership of the couple’s house.

The marriage was dissolved through Khula in 2012. The family court initially held that the wife was required to return the dower received as Badl-i-Khula (compensation for Khula), while other disputes, including maintenance, dowry articles, gold ornaments and delivery expenses, remained pending.

In 2018, the family court partly decreed the suit, awarding maintenance and ordering recovery of dowry articles. It also directed the wife to return 11 tolas of gold, or its value, to the husband.

The appellate court upheld these findings in 2020, reducing only the annual increase in the minor child’s maintenance from 15 to 10 pc.

On maintenance, Justice Kamran upheld the concurrent findings, noting that the husband had withheld his complete salary record and produced only a certificate showing his basic pay. The courts were therefore entitled to draw an adverse inference regarding his actual earning capacity.

The judge also noted that the husband’s brother had testified that he owned a Honda Civic, further undermining his claim of limited means. The court held that it would not permit a “financially capable parent” to understate his resources to reduce his obligations towards his child.

Regarding the matrimonial house, the judge upheld findings that the wife’s father, who was working abroad at the time, had financed its entire purchase through a documented chain of banking transactions. Bank officials corroborated the transactions, and their testimony remained largely unchallenged during cross-examination.

Since the husband had never actually paid for the house despite its inclusion in the dower, the judge held that it could not be reclaimed as Badl-i-Khula. He also upheld the wife’s subsequent transfer of the house to her father and the decree granting him possession.

On the claim for 11 tolas of gold, Justice Kamran found that the lower courts had erred by treating the absence of documentary evidence as decisive while overlooking corroborating circumstances.

Given the husband’s established financial incapacity, the judge held that it was more probable that the gold, too, had been financed by the wife’s father.

“Consequently, the respondent cannot claim return of the said ornaments as Badl-i-Khula,” the judge held, because they did not represent dower financed or paid for by him from his own resources.

Regarding 22 tolas of dowry gold, the judge upheld the findings against the wife, noting that she had never claimed the jewellery was forcibly taken from her. Her inconsistent accounts about when she left the matrimonial home, coupled with her refusal to produce a video of her sister’s wedding showing her wearing jewellery after leaving her husband’s home, also supported an adverse inference.

Justice Kamran upheld the dismissal of the wife’s Rs63,000 claim for maternity/delivery expenses.

Published in Dawn, September 1st, 2026