advice for marriage or fiance uk/pakistan

[cricketgirl]

Have been with my partner for over a year now. He is a Pakistani man that lived in the UK for a while under one of the student visa schemes. We started our relationship approx 7 months before his visa expired and he returned to Pakistan in the summer of 2009. The relationship although now a long distance one has still continued. I recently went to Pakistan to visit him and we got engaged. There was just the two of us, no family members although a couple of friends where present at the time. There was no formal engagement party but he proposed to me and gave me a ring.

We are both in our 30's. I'm a British Citizen who works full time with a regular good wage and plenty of savings. I live in private rented accommodation. I can provide wage slips, banks statements, tenancy agreement and copies of bills. We have many photographs of us together before he left the UK, on holiday and in various locations. I even have a copy of his airline ticket to show the day he left the country. We have alot of photographs from my trip to Pakistan to include pictures of the day we got engaged with our 2 friends present. I've got my visa stamped in my passport, flight tickets and guest house accommodation details. I've got plenty of email evidence that we are in a relationship, literally hundreds of texts...can provide copies of phone bills to show texts and calls. Have got birthday cards. Can also prove that he is currently having all his post from the UK redirected to my property.

I'm hoping that this evidence will show that this is a serious relationship and not some visa scam.

Really unsure though whether to go down the fiance visa route or the marriage visa route. I understand they are fairly similar?? I don't mind whether I get married in the UK or in Pakistan and neither does he. In some ways I'm tempted to go down the marriage in Pakistan route....does anyone have any experience of this??? Is this possible for a UK resident?? and whats the procedure?

I guess I'm just looking for anyone else's experiences. We are just two people that are in a serious long term relationship and want to get married. Just want to make sure we do have sufficient evidence and wondering what is the best option to go for?? marriage will be the outcome no matter what.

Any help or advice would be really gratefully received.

Many thanks and a Happy New Year 2010

[meats]

I believe that the marriage visa route means that you can get married in the UK but then he'd have to leave afterwards. There are plenty of Pakistanis on here so i'm sure one of them will tell you the procedure of how to go about getting married in Pakistan. Alternatively if there's a British embassy in Pakistan then google it, they usually have details of what is needed for a British citizen to get married there.