Well, if you had your phone synced to a Google account, and updated it regularly, the contacts would be there. Or if you had them saved to a SD card, they should be readable from it. However, if they are on a dead phone, there is no way to get them. If they were deleted there is a very slim chance you can get them back, but it is really slim. Once deleted, they are meant to be gone.
There are a few apps/programs out there that 'may' be able to help you recover the data.
A few of the programs you could try would be... DiskDigger, MobiSaver, Android-Recovery and Tenorshare. They are all data recovery apps/programs. There are many others out there, so check around and see which you would rather try. There is also one called RECUVA, that...