Can gifts to lover become loans after break-up? Singapore High Court answers

The Singapore High Court on September 9 rejected a claim by TCI Express CEO and Managing Director Chander Agarwal seeking S$468,090 from his former girlfriend, holding that money spent on her during their relationship could not later be treated as loans. [Chander Agarwal Vs Lee Xiu]

Senior Judge Lee Seiu Kin found that the evidence overwhelmingly showed that Agarwal intended the disputed sums to be gifts to Felicia Lee, with whom he was in a relationship from September 2022 to around December 2023.

Agarwal and Lee first met on a flight in 2019 and later began meeting after he contacted her on Facebook. They entered into a romantic relationship in September 2022, which continued until around December 2023. During and even before the relationship, Agarwal spent substantial sums on Lee, including on luxury goods, travel, credit-card expenses, insurance premiums, feng shui services and an executive programme.

After suspecting Lee of infidelity, Agarwal ended the relationship and sued her in March 2024. He claimed that various sums totalling S$468,090 were not gifts but interest-free loans which Lee had agreed to repay.

The disputed amounts included spending on AMEX and Citibank cards, first-class trips to the US and Hong Kong, life insurance, a fashion company, feng shui services and programme fees. Lee denied the claim, maintaining that the expenses were gifts made out of love and affection.

Explaining why the claim failed, the Court said:

“The evidence before me points overwhelmingly to the Claimant having intended the Disputed Sums as gifts to the Defendant. The theme running through the Claimant’s case is his theory that once the Defendant accepted his offers to pay, these moneys automatically became loans.”

The Court said that a valid gift is made where there is an intention to gift and delivery of the subject matter. Crucially, it is the donor’s intention at the time the money is transferred that determines its character.

It also noted that once a gift has been made, the donor cannot subsequently change its character merely by asserting that it was actually a loan.

“Once a donor has made a gift, he or she cannot resile from his or her position and convert the gift into a loan.”

The reason, the Court explained, is that once the donor parts fully with the property, there is no title left with the donor which can subsequently be converted into a loan. A gift can only be revoked if there is some legal ground for setting aside the transfer.

Therefore, the central question before the High Court was whether Agarwal intended the disputed payments to be gifts or interest-free loans when he made them, rather than how he characterised them after the relationship ended.

The Court said that Agarwal had been unable to produce objective evidence showing that Lee had requested interest-free loans or agreed to repay him.

“It is incredible that for a relationship that lasted for more than a year with so many WhatsApp messages exchanged between them, the Claimant could not point to any written evidence to support his case. It is also inherently incredible that the Defendant, with her relatively modest salary, would repeatedly borrow such significant sums to spend on luxury items.”

The Court consequently found that the disputed sums were gifts and rejected his plea.

Agarwal was represented by Mohamed Baiross and Sharifah Nabilah binte Syed Omar of IRB Law LLP.

Lee was represented by Sunil Singh Panoo and Jasjeet Singh of Dhillon & Panoo LLC.

[Read Judgment]