Standard Forms Of Life Insurance Contracts In India

R Dhanalakshmi, School of Excellence in Law, The Tamil Nadu Dr. Ambedkar Law University

Dhivyaa R, School of Excellence in Law, The Tamil Nadu Dr. Ambedkar Law University

1. INTRODUCTION

One of the essentials in pursuance to a valid Contract is the element of ‘free consent’. This is embodied in Section 14 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872, which elucidates that consent is free when not obtained by fraud, misrepresentation, undue influence, coercion or mistake.1 Such consent in action is pertaining to the conditions, terms or obligations laid down in the Contract or Agreement, viz., in laymen terms, all parties entering into the Contract or Agreement shall consensually accede to its terms and conditions that is drawn at the persistence of wants and needs of and by the parties concerned. It is a paradigm of the concept “meeting of minds” which forms the foundation of contractual law. And any action in contrary manifests unfairness, detrimental to the party that has no say in drawing the conditions that shall bind both.

Notwithstanding, there exists certain species under the common genus of Contracts, in which the conditions or terms of the Agreement or Contract is independently decided by one of the parties for which the other party/ parties accede to consensually. This branch of Contracts encompasses within itself Insurance Contracts, Loan/Mortgage Deeds, and Electronic- Contracts etcetera. They are termed as Standard form of Contracts or Adhesion Contracts.

This paper shall delve into the world of Standard form of Life Insurance Contracts, focusing on different research questions all categorised into several chapters (1) Conceptual Analysis of Standard form of Insurance Contract, (2) Inspection of the Legislative Instruments governing Life Insurance Contracts (3) Vinculum of Standard form of Insurance Contracts and Rights of Consumers (4) Recommendations and (5) Comparative analysis of Standard form of Contract in potential jurisdictions.