The Scooter, the Seventeen-Year-Old, and the Word 'Ratified'
Ravi, aged 17 years and 4 months, buys a scooter from a dealer for ₹85,000, paying ₹40,000 down and signing a hire-purchase schedule for the balance. The salesman knows Ravi is a school student and does not ask for a guardian's signature. Ravi rides the scooter daily for four months, then turns 18. Five months later he writes to the dealer: 'I was a minor, the agreement is void - return my ₹40,000.' The dealer replies that Ravi kept riding after 18 and has therefore ratified the agreement, and that in any case the dealer will keep the ₹40,000 as damages, because Ravi has put 4,000 km on the scooter and it now resells for only ₹55,000. Ravi's mother wants to know whether she is personally liable, what to do with the scooter parked in their garage, and whether signing anything now would be a mistake.
1. Is the hire-purchase agreement enforceable against Ravi? Give the rule and apply it to these facts.
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No. Under the Indian Contract Act, 1872, a person below eighteen is not competent to contract (s.11). Mohori Bibee v Dharmodas Ghose settled that an agreement by a minor is void ab initio, not merely voidable - there is no contract to enforce and none to avoid. Ravi was 17 years 4 months when he signed, so the dealer cannot sue for the unpaid ₹45,000 or for breach. Section 68 does not rescue the dealer either: a scooter is not a 'necessary' for a school student, and even for genuine necessaries the claim lies against the minor's estate for the value supplied, not on the agreement. The salesman's knowledge of Ravi's age removes any argument of honest belief, though note that even a minor who lies about his age is not estopped from pleading minority in a contract action. The agreement fails at the first hurdle: capacity.
2. Does continuing to ride the scooter after turning 18 amount to ratification? Explain precisely why or why not.
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No. Ratification presupposes an existing voidable contract plus fresh assent after majority; a void agreement cannot be ratified because there is nothing to ratify. Continued possession or use after eighteen is neither fresh consideration nor an implied promise to pay. The dealer's only route would be a genuinely new post-majority contract - for instance Ravi agreeing at eighteen to pay a stated sum for the use he has already had - which would need its own consideration and its own proof. 'He kept riding it' therefore changes nothing by itself. This is where careful wording earns marks: candidates who write 'voidable' or 'ratified by conduct' concede the point the dealer needs. The correct sequence to state is: void ab initio at signing; still void after eighteen; separate fresh agreement required for any liability.
3. What can the dealer realistically recover, and what should Ravi and his mother do now?
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Restitution rather than damages. Because the agreement is void, the ₹30,000 depreciation is not claimable as contractual damages. But a minor who rescinds cannot keep both the money and the machine: s.33 of the Specific Relief Act, 1963 empowers a court, when rescinding or resisting an instrument as void, to require the restoration of any benefit received on such terms as it thinks fit, and courts have applied this to agreements with minors. So the scooter must go back. Practically: return it in its present condition, with photographs, a dated written acknowledgment, and the keys and papers; then negotiate so the dealer keeps the ₹40,000 as the price of four months' use. His mother is not a party and is not personally liable unless she gave a guarantee; she should sign nothing new. Ravi is now a major and can sign a settlement, so a short written compromise is the sensible end.