Indemnity [Sections 123 — 125]

You hire a tempo to shift your hostel luggage, and the owner says: if the police or anyone else makes trouble about the load, I will cover you. Nobody has lost anything yet, but the owner has made a promise that can cost him real money later. Is it binding, and how much can you claim if someone does sue you? Sections 124 and 125 of the Indian Contract Act answer exactly this, and the answer is narrower than most first-years expect.

In two minutes

A contract of indemnity is a promise to save the other party from loss caused by the promisor's own conduct or anyone else's conduct (s.124), and the indemnity-holder who is sued can recover damages, costs and compromise sums on the conditions in s.125.

The rest of this chapter

The full explanation, the cheat sheet, every previous-year question at every mark weight, the quiz and the answer skeletons are part of Contract – II on LexBlox Semester. Sign in to unlock the subject, or read Module 1 of Legal Language and Writing free.