Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of ethical leadership on moral motivation of teachers in the schools of Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach: Scenario-based experimental design was used to collect data (N = 174 teachers) from 25 schools in the city of Islamabad. Participants included 156 females and 18 males aged 23-37 years. Ethical leadership was measured at both construct and component levels (moral person and moral manager). Findings: The results found that the moral person component of ethical leadership style heightens the moral identity (internalization)-based moral motivation, while the moral manager component and ethical leadership at construct level style increases moral identity (symbolization)-based moral motivation. Interestingly, in the absence of reward, only the moral person component of ethical leadership style maintained participants' moral motivation. Originality/value: The originality of this study lies in highlighting the divergence in ethical leadership style at component level that explains the differences in moral motivation of the teachers.