Is it permissible for the owner of the capital in a Mudarabah company to restrict the Mudarib (entrepreneur) to a specific type of work?

Al-Kasani holds that the ruling on restricted Mudarabah (definition) (commenda) is the same as that on unrestricted Mudarabah, except for the extent of the restriction. If the restriction is beneficial, it is upheld; otherwise, it is not, based on the principle that Muslims are bound by their conditions.

Conversely, Ibn Qudamah views conditions in Mudarabah as falling into two categories: valid and invalid. Valid conditions include stipulating that the capital should not be taken on a journey, or that trading should be confined to a specific country or type of merchandise, or that purchases should be made from a particular individual. Abu Hanifa concurred with this view.

However, Malik and Al-Shafi'i disagreed regarding the validity of stipulating purchase from a specific individual or for a particular commodity that is not generally available, arguing that this obstructs the primary objective of Mudarabah, which is the pursuit of profit.

Ibn Qudamah refutes this by stating that it is a specialized Mudarabah that does not entirely prevent profit, but merely reduces it, and this does not invalidate its permissibility, similar to restricting the type of merchandise. This differs from conditions that entirely prevent profit, such as stipulating sales at cost price only.