When someone dies in Pakistan leaving bank accounts, shares, or property, the heirs rarely find that the assets simply pass to them. Banks will not release a balance on production of a death certificate. A registrar will not transfer a title on the strength of a family tree. What is required is an order of the court, and which order depends on what the assets are.
For families spread across the Gulf, the United Kingdom, North America and Australia, the process is frequently delayed for years — not because it is contested, but because nobody establishes early what is actually needed and who has to do what.
Which document you need
A succession certificate covers movable assets: bank balances, savings certificates, shares, provident fund and similar. It authorises the heirs named in it to collect those assets. This is what a bank will ask for.
Letters of administration are granted where the deceased left no will, and are the route for dealing with the estate more broadly, including immovable property.
Probate applies where there is a valid will, and is the process by which the executor named in it is authorised to act.
Families often ask for "a succession certificate" when what the estate actually needs is letters of administration, and discover the mismatch after filing. The first useful step is a short review of what the deceased actually owned.
Who the heirs are is a question of law, not agreement
Shares in the estate of a Muslim decedent are determined by the applicable personal law, not by what the family considers fair, and not by what the deceased said informally. The court will require the heirs to be identified and will not simply accept a list.
This matters for two reasons. First, an heir who is left out — a married daughter, a half-sibling, a grandchild through a predeceased parent — has a claim that does not disappear because the rest of the family proceeded without them. Second, a distribution agreed among some heirs and executed through the court can be reopened later, and estates settled "informally" thirty years ago are a recurring source of litigation today.
Where the family genuinely wishes to distribute differently from the default shares, that can often be achieved — but it should be documented properly rather than assumed.
How heirs abroad take part
This is the question overseas clients ask first, and the answer is straightforward: you do not usually need to travel.
Heirs outside Pakistan ordinarily participate through:
- A power of attorney, executed before and attested by the Pakistani mission in your country of residence, then attested in Pakistan. See our guide on giving a power of attorney from abroad.
- Affidavits sworn before the mission where the court requires a statement from a particular heir.
- No-objection statements where an heir consents to another heir administering the estate.
The practical constraint is not the court's willingness to accept these — it is the time it takes to get several relatives in several countries to each attend their local mission. That co-ordination, not the litigation, is what usually determines how long an uncontested estate takes.
What the process involves
- Establish the assets. Bank statements, share certificates, title documents, and the death certificate. Where the family does not know what exists, this stage takes longest.
- Identify the heirs and obtain their identity documents.
- File the petition in the appropriate court, with the list of assets and heirs.
- Publication and notice. The court issues notice so that anyone with a claim may come forward. This waiting period is fixed and cannot be compressed.
- Grant. The court grants the certificate or letters, generally on furnishing security or a surety as it directs.
- Collection and distribution of the assets against the grant.
An uncontested matter with complete documentation commonly takes several months. Where the records are incomplete, an heir cannot be located, or the grant is opposed, it takes considerably longer.
Points that cause avoidable delay
Waiting. There is no advantage in delay, and two real disadvantages: bank records become harder to obtain, and property left unattended attracts occupation. Families often wait through a mourning period and then through a disagreement, and start three years late.
Assuming one heir can act alone. Without a grant, no heir has authority to deal with estate assets, however senior in the family they are.
Incomplete powers of attorney. A power that does not extend to the specific acts required in a succession matter will be refused, and re-executing it from abroad costs weeks.
Property in the estate. Where the estate includes land or a house, expect the immovable side to run on a different and slower track than the bank accounts, and plan for both from the outset.
How the firm can help
We advise on which grant the estate requires, prepare and file the petition, draft the powers of attorney and affidavits your relatives abroad will need, and deal with the banks and registrars once the grant is made. Where the estate is contested, or where property has been transferred or occupied before the estate was distributed, we act in the resulting litigation.
If you are the heir abroad trying to work out where to begin, the most useful first step is simply to send us what you have — a death certificate, whatever account or title details are known, and who the surviving heirs are. We will tell you what the estate actually needs.