CASE STUDY:-Lalman Shukla V.

Gauri Dutt, 1913 40 ALJ 489

SUBMITTED BY
KHUSHI KUMARI
SEMESTER 1 SCHOOL OF LAW
BBA LLB

Submitted Under the Guidance of: Parul Raghuwanshi Ma’am

Course:- Contract 1

Lalman Shukla V. Gauri Dutt, 1913 40 ALJ 489

INTRODUCTION:-
In today’s generation contract is one of the basic element of everyone transactions related to finan-
cial aspects. Staring from very buying a simple chocolate to buying a luxurious car and also em-
ployment agreement. Therefore in our daily life knowingly and unknowingly we all are entered into
a particular contract. And the contract are govern under Indian contract act, 1872. Further under this
case study we deal with the case of Lalman Shukla v. Gauri Dutt under which we deal with the gen-
eral aspects of contract i.e. offer and acceptance.
This is the landmark judgement under the Indian contract Act,1872. In the year 1931 the case was
filed in the Allahabad high court and it was presided over by justice Banerji at the Allahabad High
Court. This case examine the contract accepts which are offer and acceptance. This landmark case
based upon the rule that if offer is not in known at all then there is no acceptance to the offer is
made, the offer is invalid and no compensation can be claimed for the same.

FACT OF THE CASE:-

1. Under this case the nephew of the defendant secretly ran away from the home and no one is able
to find where he went.
2. As respond to this, defendant sent his servant to search for his nephew to different places.
3. All the servants of the defendants went to Haridwar for the purpose of searching of nephew.
4. Defendant also handed over the money to the servants for their travel and other expanses in re-
lating to search procedure.
5. Here the plaintiff referred to be “munim" in other language servant of the defendant who went
to Haridwar to search for nephew.
6. Apart from this at that time when plaintiff left to Haridwar in search of his nephew from Kan-
pur, he made the announcement that if any person find his nephew he will be rewarded with
money Rs. 501.
7. Meanwhile, plaintiff found the nephew and communicated the same to defendant and brought
him back to Kanpur.
8. As a reward plaintiff received twenty rupees but suddenly after 6 months due to some dispute
defendant removed him from the work.
9. Then after plaintiff claimed his reward for nephew, and plaintiff stated that even after he
brought defendant’s nephew back, plaintiff did not provide him a reward even though he per-
formed the given task.

ISSUES RAISED IN THE CASE:

1. Is this a valid contract exist?
2. Whether the reward claimed by the plaintiff should be provided or not?
3. Whether there was a valid acceptance of the offer made by the defendant?

Plaintiff Contention:-
- Plaintiff strongly contemplated that his performance was sufficient to hit the essential element of
the valid contract and he was entitled to claim the reward as it was an implied acceptance of the
general offer made by the defendant.
- He strongly affirmed that the mere performance of him finding the missing nephew was suffi-
cient to get the reward attached to such performance under which defendant announced that
whoever found his lost nephew and bring him back would get rewarded.
- According to petitioner it was immaterial that the person performing the act had the knowledge
of the reward associated with or not.
- He further referred to the section 8 of ICA, 1872 which basically stated that the performance of a
condition of a proposal is an acceptance of the proposal. And in the present case the condition
started by defendant was to find the missing nephew to be rewarded of rupees five hundred one
and he performed it well.

Respondent Contention:-
- Respondent strongly argued that the plaintiff did not know about the offer and had no knowledge
about it before going to find the nephew.
- So an offer without the knowledge of the offeree cannot be accepted and there was no chance for
plaintiff to accept the offer without even knowing about it.
- And respondent also argued that the very first rule of formation of agreement is the acceptance of
the offer and if in case plaintiff have no clue or knowledge about the offer then even no accep-
tance can be considered.
- Respondent also argued that in this case plaintiff was not know about the offer before going to
search the nephew and he was doing his duty by obey the order of his master.

Judgement
In this case, Allahabad High Court held that, as the claimed made by plaintiff upon the acceptance
of the offer was not a complete to be a valid one as the plaintiff had no clue or either knowledge of
the announcement made by the defendant as he already went to Haridwar in searching of Defen-
dant’s nephew.
Court further stated that knowledge is the main ingredient for the acceptance of offer.
And as per the facts of the case announcement was made after defendant left to Haridwar, therefore
there is np aspect of work knowledge in this case.
While talking about the plaintiffs performance, court stated that the act of the plaintiff in regard to
search for the defendant’s nephew was not because of the announcement made, it was because of
the duty towards his master as the plaintiff had a subsisting obligation to be fulfilled.
Apart for this, court stated that this offer and acceptance cannot be said to be valid because the
plaintiff can do nothing new conduct in respond for receiving the award and also there was no con-
sideration on behalf of the plaintiff so that he can claim the defendant’s reward.

Conclusion:-
Firstly general offers are basically those offers which are made to the public in general and to any
particular persons. And this judgment of Allahabad high court played a crucial role in clarified the
aspect of acceptance under the the category of general offer. By this case it was crystal clear that
when we talk about the acceptance of general offer, it can only be said to be valid when there is a
knowledge regarding that general offer. Thus this Lalman Shukla v. Gauridatt case hit almost the
basic concepts of contract which is the agreement, offer and acceptance.