Majority Act, 1875

This is a very old law, from 1875, that sets the general age of legal adulthood, called 'majority,' for people domiciled in Pakistan. Section 2 carves out exceptions: the Act does not affect a person's capacity to marry, receive dower, divorce, or adopt, and does not affect any community's religion or religious rites and customs.

Section 3 sets two different ages of majority. A minor for whom a court has appointed a guardian of person or property (other than a guardian appointed just for a lawsuit), or whose property has been placed under a Court of Wards, before that minor turns eighteen, is deemed to attain majority only at twenty-one years of age, regardless of the Succession Act, 1925 or any other law. Every other person domiciled in Pakistan attains majority at eighteen years.

Section 4 explains how age is calculated for these purposes: a person's birth day is counted as a full day, and majority begins at the very first moment of the relevant anniversary, the twenty-first for those with a court-appointed guardian, or the eighteenth for everyone else, illustrated in the Act with worked examples based on specific birth dates.