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Showing contexts for: casees of coercion in Gobardhan Das vs Jai Kishen Das on 8 February, 1900Matching Fragments
2. Now as regards the first point, no question of coercion properly so-called arises in this case. Coercion is defined in Section 15 of the Indian Contract Act. It is clear that coercion as thus defined implies a committing or threatening to commit some act which is contrary to law. No such act is alleged to have been committed or threatened in the present case. Therefore coercion may be put out of the question altogether. The question of undue influence requires further consideration. We must apply the definition of undue influence contained in Section 16 of the Contract Act, as it stood before its amendment by Section 2 of Act No. VI of 1899. The only part of Section 16 which has been suggested as applicable here is the second clause, which provides that undue influence is said to be employed "when a person whose mind is enfeebled by old age, illness, or mental or bodily distress, is so treated as to make him consent to that to which, but for such treatment, he would not have consented, although such treatment may not amount to coercion." If the appellant's consent to the submission was caused by undue influence as thus defined, the contract was voidable at his option under Section 19. Now the circumstances under which the submission was entered into were these. There had been certain dealings between the appellant Gobardhan Das and one Gopal Das, the son of the plaintiff-respondent Jai Kishen Das. Gopal Das was a young man of twenty-two. The appellant was his cousin. It appears that the appellant got Gopal Das to execute a deed of sale of Gopal Das' share in certain ancestral property. There were two deeds, one was taken in the name of Gobind Das, a relative of the appellant, and after that there was a further deed executed by Govind Das in the appellant's favour. On the 26th November 1896, a complaint was filed before a Magistrate by Gopal Das against Gobardhan Das, in which he charged the appellants with offences of criminal breach of trust and cheating under the Indian Penal Code in connection with the execution of the deeds, and on the following day, the 27th, the Court directed that the case should be sent to the police for investigation. While it was still under investigation the submission now in question was executed on the 4th December 1896. The submission is signed by Jai Kishen Das and the appellant Gobardhan Das. It recites a dispute between the executants; it states that "the parties are ready to have recourse to the Civil and Criminal Courts," and that therefore, at the request of some of the relatives of the parties, in order to settle the matter, they appoint certain persons as arbitrators, and declare that they will accept whatever award the arbitrators may honestly make with respect to the dispute relating to the sale deeds. On the next day, that is, the 5th December, the complainant Gopal Das presented an application to the Magistrate, in which, referring to his complaint, he stated that he could not adduce evidence in the case, and, as the police had not as yet taken any proceedings, he prayed that the case might be struck off and his original application returned without any further inquiry. The only order then made was that the application should be sent to the police. Matters remained in that position at the time when the award was made on the 24th December 1896, and ultimately, on the 7th January 1897, the Magistrate made an order to the effect that the complainant did not desire to proceed further with the case, and virtually shelving the complaint altogether. The award and the decree thereon were in the respondent's favour.