The National Law School of India Review (NLSIR) is organising a Book Talk on “A Historical Introduction to Indian Contract Law” (Routledge) by Dr. Shivprasad Swaminathan, Dean, Shiv Nadar School of Law. The talk will take place on March 4, 2026, at 5 pm, NAB 101 on the University campus.

This event is open to the public. Please note, registration for members outside of the NLSIU community is mandatory to attend the event. Scan the QR Code on the poster to register at least 24-hours before the start time.

Panellists

• Professor Shivprasad Swaminathan, Author and Dean, Shiv Nadar School of Law
• Prof. (Dr.) Nigam Nuggehalli, Registrar In-Charge and Chair Professor, Department of Revenue Chair, Professor of Law, National Law School of India University, Bengaluru
• Mr. M. V Swaroop, Advocate, Madras High Court
• Mr. Kaustav Saha, Assistant Professor of Law, NLSIU

The panel will particularly grapple with concepts of (i) privity; (ii) undue influence; (c) damages; and (d) stipulated sums. Dr. Shivprasad and the panel will discuss questions on these concepts followed by an opportunity for a Q&A with the attendees.

About the book

Dr. Shivprasad’s book offers a genealogy of the core concepts of Indian contract law, tracing their trajectory from the nineteenth century soil of English jurisprudence in which they germinated, to their transplantation into the Indian Contract Act 1872, and the interpretation of the provisions containing these concepts by Indian courts and influential treatise-writers, over the last one hundred and fifty years.

The concepts studied by the book are: i) formation; ii) consideration; iii) privity; iv) capacity; v) consent; vi) frustration; vii) damages viii) stipulated sums; and ix) unjustified enrichment. With respect to each of these concepts, the book seeks to provide an account of the state of the English law at the eve of the drafting of the Act, with a particular emphasis on the impact the civil law had on the concept and a close study of the legislative history of the provisions of the Act codifying the concept, with a view to uncovering what the drafters had originally envisaged.

Based on extensive doctrinal and archival research, the book offers:

• a historical background to the drafting of the Indian Contract Act and the codification process
• a jurisprudential exploration of the limitations of common law codification gleaned from the working of the Act
• the draft of the contract code accompanying the report of the Indian Law Commissioners in 1866, which is essential to understand the intention of the drafters of the Act
• historical insights which hold the key to illuminating contemporary contract law problems of the kind courts routinely grapple with