Pakistan Case Law

Full-text search of Pakistani judgments (Supreme Court, High Courts, Federal Shariat Court and tribunals, 1970 onward), with optional filters by court, judge, law report and year. Ranking follows how lawyers research: nearness to the legal point decides which cases are returned; among comparably-near cases, more senior court > larger bench > more recent > more cited. For the current state of the law, add year_from (e.g. 2025); use sort='court' for the most authoritative first. With no query, the filters list judgments newest first - e.g. court='Supreme Court' gives the latest Supreme Court judgments, journal='PLD' with year_from=year_to=2024 gives that volume, and sort='recently_added' alone shows what was added to the site most recently. Returns cases with id, title, citation, court, year, outcome and the public URL. For an exact report citation use caselaw_lookup_citation. To read a case, pass its id to caselaw_get_case.

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  "properties": {
    "query": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 200,
          "minLength": 2,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Keywords, e.g. 'bail murder 302' or 'khula dower'. May be left out when a filter is given.",
      "title": "Query"
    },
    "court": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 100,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Only this court: 'Supreme Court', 'Lahore High Court' (or 'LHC'), 'Sindh High Court', 'Peshawar High Court', 'Islamabad High Court', 'Balochistan High Court', 'Federal Shariat Court', or a tribunal's name",
      "title": "Court"
    },
    "judge": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 100,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Only judgments where this judge sat on the bench. Spelling-tolerant: 'Asif Khosa', 'Qazi Faez Isa'. The reply names the judge it matched.",
      "title": "Judge"
    },
    "journal": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 20,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Only judgments reported in this law report: 'PLD', 'SCMR', 'CLC', 'YLR', 'PLC(CS)', 'PTD' ... With year_from/year_to it selects that volume, e.g. SCMR 2025.",
      "title": "Journal"
    },
    "year_from": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maximum": 2100,
          "minimum": 1900,
          "type": "integer"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Earliest year (inclusive)",
      "title": "Year From"
    },
    "year_to": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maximum": 2100,
          "minimum": 1900,
          "type": "integer"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Latest year (inclusive)",
      "title": "Year To"
    },
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "sort": {
      "default": "relevance",
      "description": "relevance (default: nearest on the point, then court/bench/recency/citations) | newest (the ~200 closest matches in strict date order) | court (most senior court first) | recently_added (newest additions to the site). For the CURRENT law on a point, keep relevance and set year_from (e.g. 2025): strict date order can surface judgments that only mention the point in passing.",
      "title": "Sort",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "response_format": {
      "default": "markdown",
      "enum": [
        "markdown",
        "json"
      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "title": "caselaw_searchArguments"
}

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  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_searchOutput"
}

Find judgments by the QUESTION they settle, rather than by words they contain. Every judgment summary on this corpus records the questions that judgment actually decides — e.g. "Does delay in lodging the FIR by itself entitle the accused to bail?" This searches those questions, so it matches the shape a legal problem arrives in rather than the vocabulary a 1987 bench happened to use. COVERAGE IS PARTIAL: only some judgments have a summary with questions yet (the response's `coverage_note` gives the current live ratio, which keeps growing). An empty result means no *summarised* judgment matched — it does NOT mean no such judgment exists. Fall back to caselaw_search, which covers the whole corpus. The questions are prepared from the judgment text. They are a finding aid, not a holding: cite the judgment, never the question. Pass an id to caselaw_get_case to read it.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "query": {
      "description": "The legal question or its subject, in the words a judgment would use — 'delay in lodging FIR', 'concurrent findings of fact', 'pre-arrest bail murder'",
      "maxLength": 200,
      "minLength": 2,
      "title": "Query",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "court": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 100,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Only this court, e.g. 'Supreme Court' or 'Lahore High Court'",
      "title": "Court"
    },
    "judge": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maxLength": 100,
          "type": "string"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Only judgments where this judge sat on the bench (spelling-tolerant, e.g. 'Mansoor Ali Shah')",
      "title": "Judge"
    },
    "year_from": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maximum": 2100,
          "minimum": 1900,
          "type": "integer"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Earliest year (inclusive)",
      "title": "Year From"
    },
    "year_to": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "maximum": 2100,
          "minimum": 1900,
          "type": "integer"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Latest year (inclusive)",
      "title": "Year To"
    },
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "response_format": {
      "default": "markdown",
      "enum": [
        "markdown",
        "json"
      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "query"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_search_questionsArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_search_questionsOutput"
}

Find the judgment(s) at an exact law-report citation. Example: journal='PLD', year=1995, page=34 → PLD 1995 Supreme Court 34. Omit page to list everything reported in that journal+year. Returns the same case shape as caselaw_search.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "journal": {
      "description": "Law-report code, e.g. 'PLD', 'SCMR', 'CLC'",
      "maxLength": 30,
      "minLength": 1,
      "title": "Journal",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "year": {
      "maximum": 2100,
      "minimum": 1900,
      "title": "Year",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "page": {
      "anyOf": [
        {
          "minimum": 1,
          "type": "integer"
        },
        {
          "type": "null"
        }
      ],
      "default": null,
      "description": "Page/serial number in the report (optional)",
      "title": "Page"
    },
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "response_format": {
      "default": "markdown",
      "enum": [
        "markdown",
        "json"
      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "journal",
    "year"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_lookup_citationArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_lookup_citationOutput"
}

Fetch one judgment by id. section='summary' (default) returns metadata + the headnote (plain-language summary, the laws/provisions referred, and keyword tags) — read this first to judge relevance cheaply. section='full' additionally returns the judgment body text (capped at ~40,000 chars; the response flags body_truncated/body_chars_total when longer).

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "case_id": {
      "description": "Numeric judgment id (from a search/lookup/graph result)",
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Case Id",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "section": {
      "default": "summary",
      "description": "'summary' = metadata + headnote (cheap); 'full' = + judgment text",
      "enum": [
        "summary",
        "full"
      ],
      "title": "Section",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "response_format": {
      "default": "markdown",
      "enum": [
        "markdown",
        "json"
      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "case_id"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_caseArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_caseOutput"
}

Walk the citation graph FORWARD: list the in-corpus cases that THIS judgment cites (the precedents it relied on). Combine with caselaw_get_cited_by to traverse precedent backward and forward until a research question is resolved. Most useful on RECENT judgments: a 2024-25 case usually has nobody citing it yet, but its own citation list is a curated map of the established authority on the point.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "case_id": {
      "description": "Numeric judgment id",
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Case Id",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "response_format": {
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      "enum": [
        "markdown",
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      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
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    }
  },
  "required": [
    "case_id"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_citationsArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_citationsOutput"
}

Walk the citation graph BACKWARD: list later cases that cite THIS judgment (how it was subsequently treated — followed, distinguished, relied upon). Returns newest first. Most useful on OLDER or landmark judgments: it shows whether the case is still followed and where the principle has been applied since. A leading case can have hundreds of citing cases.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "case_id": {
      "description": "Numeric judgment id",
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Case Id",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "response_format": {
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      "enum": [
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      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "case_id"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_cited_byArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_get_cited_byOutput"
}

List the most-cited (landmark) judgments in the corpus, ranked by how many other cases cite them. A good entry point for the leading authorities on Pakistani law.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "limit": {
      "default": 20,
      "maximum": 50,
      "minimum": 1,
      "title": "Limit",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "offset": {
      "default": 0,
      "minimum": 0,
      "title": "Offset",
      "type": "integer"
    },
    "response_format": {
      "default": "markdown",
      "enum": [
        "markdown",
        "json"
      ],
      "title": "Response Format",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "title": "caselaw_most_citedArguments"
}

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "result": {
      "title": "Result",
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "result"
  ],
  "title": "caselaw_most_citedOutput"
}