Contracts which can be specifically enforced :
Section 10 provides the cases in which specific performance of contract is enforceable. It says that except as otherwise provided in this Chapter, the specific performance of any contract may, in the discretion of the Court, be enforced (a) when there exists no standard for ascertaining the actual damage caused by the non-performance of the act agreed to be done, or (b) when the act agreed to be done is such that compensation in money for its non-performance would not afford adequate relief. The explanation provides that unless and until the contrary is proved, the Court shall presume:
(i) that the breach of a contract to transfer immovable property cannot be adequately relieved by compensation in money, and (ii) that the breach of a contract to transfer movable property can be so relieved except in the two cases: (a) where the property is not an ordinary article of commerce or is of special value or interest to the plaintiff, or consists of goods which are not easily obtainable in the market, and (b) where the property is held by the defendant as the agent or trustee of the plaintiff.
So, under this Section, contracts for sale of patent right, copy right, shares of a company which are not easily available, future property, chattels of special value, etc., are specifically enforceable. In an agreement for sale of agricultural land, the respondent vendor wilfully avoided the execution of sale deed after receiving full sale consideration. Rajasthan High Court held that compensation by way of damages would not be substituted to execution of sale deed. The Court directed the respondents to enforce the specific performance of the agreement (Ram Karan and others v. Govind Lal and other, AIR 1999 Raj. 167). In a suit for specific performance of contract of sale of a house, a stranger to the contract cannot seek to be impleaded. That will change the very nature of the suit.
To succeed in a suit for specific performance, the plaintiff has to prove: (a) that a valid agreement of sale was entered into by the defendant in his favour and the terms thereof; (b) that the defendant committed breach of the contract; and (c) that he was always ready and willing to perform his part of the obligations in terms of the contract Mankaur v. Hartar Singh (2010) 10 SCC 512.