Author: Subhashree Mondal, Symbiosis Law School, Pune

Generally, e-contract is an element that throughout the world uses. Every few seconds at least 2 people would get into an e-contract. However, there is very little research over e-contracts with the relation to real cases and understanding the basic ideas. This article has various objectives; firstly, to understand the e-contracts and then, to understand the problems and the major aspect that the government should take over. The whole article goes through a roadmap which starts with specifically focusing over the basic knowledge of e-commerce and understanding how this is similar to the general contract and how this is valid through the laws and regulations. Then it moves on to another aspect which specifies and understands the problems that resolves around the people and how it is legally applicable and how the laws and interpretation of laws are applying and their relevancy also certain suggestions which might reflect the government for the betterment. The aspect of better has been reflected through international prospects as well.

KEYWORDS

E-contract; Indian Contract Act, 1872; Consumer Protection Act, 2019; Information Technology Act, 2000; e-commerce, Amazon, Flipkart, apps, cloning, guidelines on e-commerce, Ministry of Commerce. 

“Electronic Contract” (E-contract) this term has emerged from two main and meanings from terms “electronic” and “contract”. Both of these terms play a pivotal role in every human’s daily lifestyle. Electronics have combined with human’s circadian rhythm, which has also pulled the main financial and economic aspect of our life, that is “contract”. Earlier where contracts were only stuck to pen and paper jobs, now the angular direction has changed into internet custom. From buying a small milk tetra pack from Blinkit to signing a loan agreement with a bank, everything involves an e-contract. As life has made it easier to control this contract, the chance of fraudulency and unfair mode of trade and business will also grab the scope of building their ways. 

There are several videos and news reports present on the internet where they explained how they were scammed while signing an e-contract. This is where law comes to the facet. 

To facilitate e-contract legally and to save the customers from loss and scams, the main requirement of the contract was the validity of the contract. In general, under Section 2(h) of the Indian Contract Act, 1872 the legal enforceability of any agreement can be considered as a valid contract. Also, Section 3 of Indian Contract Act, 1872 only remarks the act of the parties to fulfill the communication of contract and no specific mode of communication was mentioned. The main ingredients of contract come under Section 10 of Indian Contract Act,1872 which refers to the mode of communication that can be in any form whichever is preferred by the parties. This creates an edge to the e-contract. However, there is no expressed provision under the Indian Contract Act, 1872. The explicit validity comes through Section 10A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, which states that contracts which are fulfilling all the elements of Section 10 of Indian Contract Act, 1872 would be considered as a valid contract and can’t be denied based on. This justifies the validity of e-contract. 

Under Section 2 (16) of theConsumer Protection Act, 2019, electronic commerce (e-commerce) is described as the purchasing or trading of the goods and services through digital mode. This means that all e-commerce contains e-contract. And there is an inter-relationship between e-contract and e-commerce. 

 In general, both the buyer and the seller face numerous difficulties while forming a contract electronically. This either comes through the glitch of the artificial intelligence or the technicality of the network or at certain moments it turns out to be the cause of the parties who work fraudulently towards others parties. These all generally raise questions towards the validity of the contract. When the glitch happens through the issue of technicality then it might be erased through the conversation of both the parties. 

In general, during fraudulency with customers, they get help through customer care. However, in certain cases either the scope blocks and customers face serious issues. Through certain news reports it was found that during the sale season of various e-commerce websites people need to be more cautious while shopping. This was because people generally stuck in clone websites of the various original websites, which makes it more difficult for people to come out from the problems and get a saviour from customer care. These clone websites are generally identical in nature which misled people to understand the actual websites, which let the hackers and scammers get the personal information of customers and would lead them to get access to the bank details. In Israel’s cybersecurity’s report it was found that around 1,230 new domains were found attached with Amazon emerging by June, 2024 and 85 % of them were found malicious in nature. The facet of “Amazon Prime” was more specified in the context. Similar harms were also found through the websites of Flipkart which has been investigated by Indian Today. It was found that around 3000 different websites were using the similar names and context of the company. It was also found that a government registered application of Dutch Caribbean Island is also having the similar properties. It is quite understandable that this clone site is not only sticking to hacking rather is promoting a misleading way to grab and promote their own websites and influencing people towards gambling. This leads to the clear breach of contract as it is using the misleading influence to capture the consent of the other person. Grabbing the consent of the other parties which is not free and combines a wrong influence would gradually remark the breach of contracts. This way of cloning the sites would be considered a void contract.  

The problem doesn’t stick to the cloning of the applications, to a certain extent people generally face a higher issue with the return and refund policy of the products and this leads to hampering the rights of the customers. A survey conducted by NDTV has found that applications like Meesho and Ajio fail to support the customers in this policy. It was found that moreover around 48% of the customers received wrong products and 20% of the people received counterfeit goods. Around 39% of people received fake products, while 43% of the people received goods which lacked a clear mechanism to report. The problems increase with the return of the instant delivery applications. Moreover, most of the goods purchased from the instant delivery apps don't have the policy to tackle the refund and return policy and customers were more dissatisfied in this context. In these kinds of scenarios these can be justified as a void contract based on two reasons; either as there was a misrepresentation of an object in the contract, or else there is a lacking in “consensus ad idem”, which means there is a lack of meeting of minds or agreeing to the similar things. However, for the protection of the e-Commerce websites there were Guidelines on e-Commerce which was presented by the Ministry of Commerce that made it prevail that the goods should be accepted for return in the aspect of late delivery and delivery of wrong goods. However, this was just the guidelines and the chance of implementation of this was comparatively lesser as it is not legally binding the regulations. This also refers that even if there is breach in contract the person is not getting relevant support in the breach of e-Contract. Even if we see the relevancy of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 is giving a blurry effect. 

Another aspect is delivery after refund of the amount. Recently, the famous content creator shared her experience with a food delivery application through which she has ordered the food and later on she got a call that the order was cancelled and she got the refund. After some time she again got a call from the delivery partner, he said as she got the refund she needed to pay the amount to their own account. She immediately called the restaurant and they told her not to pay. This might not seem any harm towards the people in general, however, this would cause harm to the cloud kitchens and several small restaurants. This would also create a miscommunication among both the buyers and the sellers. For a fair contract there is a requirement of understanding and giving rights to both the buyer and the seller. In this case there was a lack of fair consideration which is highly required for a fair contract.

The provisions of the Consumer Protection Act were more relevant to the contracts formed in general. According to Section 83 of the Act the person can file a complaint for the defective goods that that person would have received, this complaint would be relevant in general, however, in the context of court proceedings. However, this might be a condition categorised as a longer process. A person who received wrong goods would rather prefer to replace the goods and get the refund rather than filing a complaint in the court for their breach of contract and for their rights. Therefore, the Act is giving a scope for people to complain, however, there was a lack of practicality of the rules to apply. Additionally, there is no specific rules under the Act which specifies the return and refund policy and the protection of the customers’ rights, The guidelines on e-Commerce provides an aspect for return and refund policy for defective goods, however as it is a guideline it doesn’t bound the producers to implement a uniform rule which would give a guaranteed to all the buyers. Through this it can be understood that there was a presence of significant acts, sections and regulations but the practicality has failed. 

 Regarding the cloning of the applications Section 89 of the Act specifically mentioned that misleading advertisement would be considered as a serious wrong and also would be considered for imprisonment and fines. In the similar way the practicality of this section is also missing. Any person might file a complaint in the context of misleading advertisement but the protection of the people from these wrong and misleading websites were having less possibility to halt. 

This practicality can be understood by the correct interpretation of the judiciary. In the famous case Divya Jyoti Singh vs Union of India, it was remarked by the court that all the e-commerce sites are required to show the display of “Country of the Origin” to sell all the goods in a proper size for the customers to read it. Similarly, in the case of Amit Shukla vs Union of India & Another which states that there should be no false representation of goods and the reviews of the goods. It has also remarked that there shall be no misrepresentation in the presence of advertisement and should contain actual characteristics. And also, there should be the option of returning the goods.

This shows that the adequacy of Consumer Protection Act, 2019 was not relevant in a bigger term through laws and provisions, however, the court interpretation has made it a wider scope. Still the significant might face challenges in terms of implementation and later there is a chance of becoming more complicated in the phrase where a larger commercial part is based on the technical aspect and fintech. 

The whole system and problems can’t be resolved only through the case laws, rather there is a requirement of specific laws and regulations for better implementations. There was a presence of the use and the relevancy are quite less and there is a higher possibility of evolution of various other scopes and types of new scams and types may appear. This reflects that there is a requirement of specific laws and regulations for e-contracts and e-commerce for better enforceability and for better application as the new phrase of the world is constantly running based on artificial intelligence (AI) and technologies, commerce would be grabbing a bigger aspect. This can be better understood through the criteria and the implementation of Sale of Goods Act, 1930 and Partnership India Act, 1932 and repeal of it through Indian Contract Act, 1872. There is a significant requirement of e-commerce protection for both the customers and traders and requirement of privacy over their details and documents.

The adoption of Laws and regulations like European Union’s E-commerce Directives or like China’s E-Commerce Law might also create a safer aspect for Indian customers and traders.  

There is an ample amount of news reports, news articles and short videos available on the internet which reflect numerous problems that are occurring in the daily life of various peoples. Several case laws are also available in this context which also reflects the moral interpretation of laws and regulations. However, there are very few articles which reflect the concept of e-commerce and consumer protection in a wholesome way. There were several research papers which spoke over the analysis of the old consumer protection law and e-contracts. However, certain research papers are based on the survey that they conducted over various people of the general people. 

This research article has followed all the secondary sources that are present over the internet resources which includes legal statutes of the legislatures, the case laws, various news articles and reports which are present as a resource. These resources help in implementing various arguments which are giving an unbalanced view over the adequacy of the contract. 

In this current situation as well as after understanding the present e-commerce market demand, this can be understood in a better way that the e-contract would grab a major aspect in future. These increase the requirement of more specific and standard laws, rules and regulations over e-contracts. This significance is required because all problems can’t be modified through only the previous laws as this might lead to a subject of irrelevancy and might not fit with the similar aspect. This signifies the use of the old laws in a different way rather than including both of them together. 

1. Indian Contract Act,1872, § 2(h), No. 9 Acts of Parliament, 1872 (India)

2. Indian Contract Act,1872, § 3, No. 9 Acts of Parliament, 1872 (India)

3. Indian Contract Act,1872, § 10, No. 9 Acts of Parliament, 1872 (India)

4. Information Technology Act,2000 § 10A, No. 21 Acts of Parliament, 2000(India)

5. Consumer Protection Act,2019, § 2(16), No. 35 Acts of Parliament, 2019(India)

6. Consumer Protection Act,2019, § 83, No. 35 Acts of Parliament, 2019(India)

7. Consumer Protection Act,2019, § 89, No. 35 Acts of Parliament, 2019(India)

8. Aakash Sharma, Jainam Shah, Big discounts, big frauds: Amazon, Flipkart customers target, INDIA TODAY (Jul 9, 2024, 17:53 PM) https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/big-discounts-big-frauds-amazon-flipkart-customers-targeted-2564405-2024-07-09 

9. Amazon Prime Day 2024: Cyber criminals Are Ready- Are You ?, CHECK POINT (July 4, 2024) https://blog.checkpoint.com/security/amazon-prime-day-2024-cyber-criminals-are-ready-are-you/

10. Divya Prata, Amazon India’s Most Favoured E-Commerce Platform For Returns, NDTV Profit, (Jan 16, 2025) https://www.ndtvprofit.com/business/amazon-indias-most-favoured-e-commerce-platform-for-returns

11. Advisory to State Government/ Union Territories: Model Framework for Guidelines on e-Commerce for consumer protection, https://consumeraffairs.nic.in/sites/default/files/file-uploads/latestnews/Guidelines%20on%20e-Commerce%20date%20extend.pdf, 

12. Sonali, ‘Still shows up with food after refund’: User shares bizarre food ordering incident, warns of growing frauds vis ‘Swiggy-Zomato’, business today, (May 3,2025), https://www.businesstoday.in/technology/news/story/still-shows-up-with-food-after-refund-user-shares-bizarre-food-ordering-incident-warns-of-growing-frauds-via-swiggy-zomato-474593-2025-05-03

13. Nikhil Nair, E-Contracts, INDIAN NATIONAL BAR ASSOCIATION, https://www.indianbarassociation.org/e-contracts/

14. Divya Jyoti Singh v. Union of India, SLP (Crl) No.-004396-2025

15. Amit Kumar Shukla VS Union of India, WRIT PETITION (ST.) NO. 9335 OF 2021