REMEDIES AND RELIEF IN CONTRACT

A contract is a legally binding agreement which recognises and governs the rights
and duties of the parties to the agreement. A contract is legally enforceable because
it meets the requirements and approval of the law. An agreement typically involves
the exchange of goods, services, money, or promises of any of those. In the event of
breach of contract, the law awards the injured party access to legal remedies such
as damages and cancellation.

REMEDIES-
Remedies are intended to make the nonbreaching party whole. The two categories
of remedies for breach of contract are legal and equitable. In the legal category are
damages; in the equitable category are specific performance, injunctions, and
restitution. The law does not force a party to perform; he or she always has the
power (though not the right) to breach, and may do so if it is economically more
advantageous to breach and suffer the consequence than to perform. Remedies,
though, are not (usually) intended to punish the breaching party.

Where a party performing a contract does not do so to the standard required by the
contract or within the time frame set, that party is said to have committed breach of
contract. The party committing breach of contract is known as the ‘guilty party’ and
the other party is known as the ‘injured’ or ‘aggrieved’ party. The latin maxim ‘ubi jus,
ibi remedium’ denotes ‘where there is a right, there is a remedy’. The word
‘damages’ means monetary compensation for loss suffered. Whenever a breach of
contract takes place, the remedy of damages is the one that comes to mind
immediately as the consequence of breach. A breach of contract may put the
aggrieved party to some disadvantage or inconvenience or may cause a loss to him.
The court would desire the guilty party to accept responsibility for any such loss of
the aggrieved party and compensate him adequately. The quantum of damages is
determined by the magnitude of loss caused by the breach. Damages are meant to
compensate the injured party for any consequences of the breach of contract. The
underlying principle is to put the injured party financially as near as possible, into the
position he would have been in had the promise been fulfilled.