Har Bhajan Lal v Har Charan Lal (1925)

It is the Indian companion to Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball Co. A father advertised a reward to anyone who found his runaway son; a stranger who had read the hand-bill found the boy and claimed the money. The Chief Justice treated the hand-bill as a general offer, "capable of acceptance by any person who fulfilled the condition", and held that substantial performance of that condition earned the reward. The case is useful precisely because it is short: the whole rule of general offers is stated in three sentences.

Note also that the plaintiff had seen the hand-bill before he acted — "one of these hand-bills came into the possession of the plaintiff, and the plaintiff undoubtedly had the boy's name in his memory." He acted knowing of the offer. That is the fact that separates this case from situations where the finder acts in ignorance of any offer.

• Ram Kishen, a boy of 13 or 14, ran away from his father's home at Baheri on 9 June 1924.
• The father issued a pamphlet offering a reward: "Anybody who finds trace of the boy and brings him home, will get Rs. 500." (The judgment records this as the agreed translation.)
• One of the hand-bills came into the plaintiff's possession, and he remembered the boy's name.
• On 19 July the plaintiff was at the dharamshala of Bareilly Junction railway station. He saw a boy, overheard part of a conversation, realised the boy was the missing Ram Kishen, and "promptly took him to the Railway Police Station where he made a report and sent a telegram to the boy's father saying that he had found his son."
• The plaintiff sued for the Rs. 500. The Court of Small Causes, Bareilly, dismissed the claim. The plaintiff applied to the High Court in revision.

1. Was the hand-bill an offer capable of acceptance by any member of the public?
2. Had the plaintiff performed the condition of the offer, given that he did not himself take the boy to his father's home but handed him to the railway police and telegraphed the father?

The revision was allowed. The Small Cause Court's decision was set aside and a decree passed for the plaintiff for Rs. 500 with costs.

• A general offer. "The hand-bill was an offer open to the whole world and capable of acceptance by any person who fulfilled the condition." (The scanned text reads "whale world"; the word is plainly whole.)
• The real condition. The Chief Justice restated the offer in its substance: "I will pay Rs. 500 to any one who finds my son and brings him home".
• Substantial performance is enough. "I am of opinion that the plaintiff substantially performed the condition and that the judgment of the Small Cause Court is extremely artificial."
• The Court described it at the outset as "a curious case", and framed the whole question as "whether he had not substantially fulfilled the terms offered."

An advertisement offering a reward to anyone who performs a stated act is a general offer to the world. Any person who, knowing of it, performs the condition accepts it and may sue for the reward. The condition is read according to its real substance, not artificially: finding the boy, securing him with the police and telegraphing the father substantially performed an offer to pay whoever "finds my son and brings him home".

• Direct question: What is a general offer? How is it accepted? Illustrate with Indian and English cases. Pair this case with Carlill: both hold that performing the condition is acceptance, and that the offer may be made to the world at large.
• Problem question: a reward notice promises money to whoever "brings back" a lost dog; the finder hands it to the police, who return it. Use this case: the condition is read for its substance, and substantial performance earns the reward.
• Point to stress: the plaintiff had read the hand-bill and knew of the offer before he acted. Always state whether the claimant knew of the offer; that fact decides whether there was an acceptance at all.
• Caution: this is a single-judge Allahabad High Court decision in revision. Cite it as a High Court illustration.