Group A

1. (a) If an offeror does not prescribe a time period within which the offer is required to be accepted,
it lapses after a reasonable period. Which in turn means that the offer loses its legal efficacy.
However, what reasonable time is a questions of fact and it differs from one contract to another.
Thus, there is no fixed time on long the offer will remain open for acceptance if a time period is not
prescribed.

(b) If an acceptance letter somehow gets lost while being in transmission process or never reached
the offeree at all, there will still be a binding contract it is because an acceptance is enough as
communication, even if it never reaches to the offeror. Thus, if an offeror makes an offer to an
offeree, the offeree must not remain silent and inform the offeror about his decision. So, if the
offeree accepts the offer and sends an acceptance letter, it is enough to be a binding contract, as it
has been settled in the case of Household Fire Insurance Co. V. Grant. In this case, the acceptance
letter was lost while being delivered to the offeror, but it was acknowledged by the highest court in
England that the acceptance was sufficiently contact and so a binding contract exists.

3. (a) Consideration is the price for which the promise of one party is purchased by another. It is
either some act or promise, done, suffered or made by the promisee of the promise of the promisor.
However there are rules that needs to be taken into account before a consideration is thought to be
valid. According to Section 25 of the Contract Act an agreement made without consideration is valid
except in the following cases:

 A gratuitous promise is binding if it be writing and registered and made on account of

natural love and the parties being in close relation to each other.
 A gratuitous promise is also binding when it is a promise to compensate fully or in part.
 A promise to pay a time-barred debt is also enforceable, provided the promise is in writing
and is signed by the promisor.

(b) An unenforceable contract contains all essential elements of a valid contract, but still cannot be
enforced in the court. This is because, the contract itself is valid because judged by the rules of law,
and the contract has no issues at all. However, it cannot be enforced because of the difficulty
created by the law of procedure. For example, if Maisha provides loan to Tamim, the contract of
loan will be valid in this case. However, if Maisha does not sue Tamim on the contract within the
period prescribed by the law of limitation and allows her claim to be barred by time, she cannot
recover from Tamim afterwards. This is because even though the contract was valid, the4 Statute of
Limitations bars the suit. This is why, an unenforceable contract cannot be enforced in the court.

Group B

6. Arif bought a painting from ‘Dreek’ Art Gallery at Dhanmondi thinking it to be a work of Jainal
Abedin, a famous Bangladeshi artist. However, the painting was in fact a replica, and the owner of
the art gallery knew that. The owner did not mention this fact to Arif despite knowing that he was
making a mistake. Afterwards, Arif came to know about the truth and decided to sue the owner of
‘Dreek’ gallery.

According to Section 14, this is considered to be fraud. Silence is considered to be fraud in cases
where silence is equivalent to speech. For example, A sells a car to B. However, B thinks the car is in
prime condition whereas in reality it is not and is highly damaged. A knows about this but chooses to
not disclose this information to B. This is considered to be fraud as A’s silence is equivalent to speech
and so B can sue A for fraud. In this case the owner ‘Dreek’ gallery’s silence was equivalent to speech
because he purposely choose to hide information from Arif which could alter his buying decisions.
Thus Arif can sue the owner of ‘Dreek’ gallery according to Section 19. He can avoid the performance
of the contract, which in turn means that he can get a refund from the art gallery and return the
painting. Or he can insist to be in the act of agreement again, which all proper information available
to him this time. He can also sue the owner of ‘Dreek’ gallery for any kind of damages.

8. Adidas(BD) Ltd. Enters into a contract with Sunshine fabrics for supply of 50.000 pcs of T-shirt as
per sample and design. One of the provision of the contract was, “the Sunshine Fabrics would not
sell to his other customers for a period of 2 years any T-shirt of the same design and description”.
However, Sunshine Fabrics started selling them to different shops who offered higher prices,
ignoring their contract with ADIDAS(BD) Ltd. ADIDAS(BD) Ltd. Sued Sunshine Fabrics for damage and
compensations on accounts of breach of contract. However, Sunshine Fabrics asserted that their
contract was void according to Section 27, The Contract Act.

It is stated in Section 27, The Contract Act that, any agreement that deprives a person from his right
to exercise a lawful profession, trade or business is void. Even though in England, if a restraint is
reasonable it is valid, the same cannot be applied in Bangladesh. The law in Bangladesh does not
acknowledge any restraint of trade except certain cases under the provisions of Sec. 27, The
Contract Act, Sec. 11(2), 36(2), 54 and 53(3) of the Partnership Act 1932. Those certain cases involve
‘freedom of action’ as not being void. If in an agreement, a certain party agrees that he would not
sell any goods of the same description to anyone else for a certain period of time as he is in contract
with the other party, it is restraint of trade.

Thus, in the case of Sunshine Fabrics, a breach of contract has been made according to Section 27,
and so ADIDAS(BD) Ltd. can sue them.