The Specific Relief (Amendment) Act, 2018
(“AmendmentAct“),
which has brought significant amendments to the Specific Relief
Act, 1963 (“Act“) was notified on
August 1, 2018 and has become effective therefrom. While the
Amendment Act has introduced various changes, one of the most
significant change introduced is that specific performance of
contracts has been made a rule rather than an exception. In our
next series of articles, we focus on the four exceptions laid down
in the Amendment Act to the specific performance rule.
Specific performance means enforcement of exact terms of the
contract. Under it, the plaintiff claims for the specific thing of
which he is entitled as per the terms of contract. For example, if
A agrees to sell certain shares to B of a specific company which
are limited in number and after the payment made by B, if A refuses
to sell the shares, then B through specific performance is entitled
to recovery of those shares.
