Section 4 - Contract Act

"4. Communication when complete.-The communication of a proposal is complete when it comes to the knowledge of the person to whom it is made.

The communication of an acceptance is complete,-

as against the proposer, when it is put in a course of transmission to him, so as to be out of the power of the acceptor;

as against the acceptor, when it comes to the knowledge of the proposer.

The communication of a revocation is complete,-

as against the person who makes it, when it is put into a course of transmission to the person to whom it is made, so as to be out of the power of the person who makes it;

as against the person to whom it is made, when it comes to his knowledge."

9. It is a well-established principle of law that only when an offer is accepted that the contract is concluded and binds the parties. It is equally well settled that before an offer is accepted, the offerer can withdraw his offer, but if the acceptance is conditional or is not final, men there is no concluded contract. Section 5 of the Indian Contract Act states that a proposal may be revoked at any time before the communication of its acceptance is complete as against the proposer, but not afterwards, Similarly, an acceptance may be revoked at any time before the communication of the acceptance is complete as against the acceptor, but not afterwards.

Held,

"17. In the instant case the provisions of S. 34 prescribe the manner in which a contract is to be made on behalf of the Board of Trustees and further sub-section (3) contains a prohibition that a contract not made in accordance with the earlier portions of Section shall not be binding on the Board. It has been held by the Supreme Court in its decision reported in H.S. Rokhy v. New Delhi Municipality AIR 1962 SC 554 that the effect of such a prohibition as is contained in sub-sec. (3) of S. 34 renders the contract itself void and unenforceable. In that case the controversy was about estoppel against New Delhi Municipal Corporation which was governed by the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911, which contains a similar provision viz., S. 47."

In Ramji Dayawala & sons [P] Ltd. v. Invest Import [AIR 1981 SC 2085], a two-Judge Bench considered the existence of the contract and arbitration clause thereunder. This Court had held that in the facts of a given case acceptance of a suggestion may be sub silentio reinforced by the subsequent conduct. Where there is a mistake as to terms of a document, amendment to the draft was suggested and a counter-offer was made, the signatory to the original contract is not estopped by his signature from denying that he intended to make an offer in the terms set out in the document. Where the contract is in a number of parts it is essential to the validity of the contract that the contracting party should either have assented to or taken to have assented to the same thing in the same sense or as it is sometimes put, there should be consensus ad idem. In this case a sub-contract was signed and executed by the Managing Director of the appellant-Company but part of the contract was altered subsequently since counter-proposal was given by the respondent. This Court had held that one such case is where a part of the offer was disputed at the negotiation stage and the original offeree communicated that fact to the offeror saying that he understood the offer in a particular sense; this communication probably amounts to a counter-offer in which case it may be that mere silence of the original offeror will constitute his acceptance. Where there is a mistake as to the terms of the documents as in that case, amendment to the draft was suggested and a counter-offer was made, the signatory to the original contract is not estopped by his signature from denying that he intended to make an offer in the terms set out in the document; to wit, the letter and the cable. It can, therefore, be stated that where the contract is in a number of parts it is essential to the validity of the contract that the contracting party should either have assented to or taken to have assented to the same thing in the same senseor as it is sometimes put, there should be consensus ad idem. It was held that there was no consensus ad idem to the original contract. It was open to the party contending novatio to prove that he had not accepted a part of the original agreement though it had signed the agreement containing that part.