The main legal point established in the judgment is that the District Court has jurisdiction to grant a probate effective only with respect to the properties inside the State, as interpreted from the Indian Succession Act.

1. The 16th counter-petitioner, in a proceeding initiated before the District Court, Trichur, by the respondent herein for the grant of a probate of a registered will dated 2 91958 said to have been executed by her late husband, T. V. Kochuvareed, is the appellant. The appellant, by means of an application dated 13th of August 1962, contended before the lower court that it had no jurisdiction to entertain the application for probate because properties worth more than Rs. 10,000/ -belonging to the estate of the deceased were situate outside the State of Kerala. It is admitted that item No. 3 of the A schedule to the Probate application is situate in the State of Madras and that the value of that item is over Rs. 10,000-The contention that was urged before the Court below was that in view of the proviso to S.273 of the Indian Succession Act, XXXIX of 1925, (hereinafter referred to as the Act), the District Court was incompetent to issue a probate in this case that will be effective throughout India, and, therefore, had no jurisdiction to entertain the application. The application, it is contended, should have been moved before the High Court, that Court being competent to grant a probate for the entire properties and estate of the testator, wherever situate in India. This contention was rejected by the court below and the application moved by the appellant dismissed by the order appealed against.

2. No argument was addressed before us regarding the competency of this appeal, but we doubt whether an appeal would lie from such an order. The only question that has been determined by the District Court is that it has jurisdiction. Such an order cannot be said to be one passed under the Act. S.299 of the Act, providing that

"Every order made by a District Judge by virtue of powers hereby conferred upon him shall be subject to appeal to the High Court in accordance with the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, applicable to appeals."

may not, therefore apply.

In the decision reported in Fakriji Navroji v. Maherban Faredoon (AIR. 1942 Bombay 276), Sir Beaumont C. J., who wrote the judgment, observed that when a District Judge exercises his discretion under S.271 of the Act, he cannot be said to be making an order under the Act. He is merely deciding to proceed with the application and therefore no right of appeal is granted by S.299 against such an order. We think the same reasoning must apply to this case and that the appeal is not maintainable. We would, however, treat this appeal as a revision petition and deal with it as such. The case will be renumbered as a revision petition.

3. The question to be decided is whether there is by implication it is not contended, nor do we see any express provision in the Act, prohibiting the District Court from exercising its jurisdiction under the Section in cases of this type an exclusion of the jurisdiction of the District Court to grant a probate when the probate cannot be effective in regard to the properties outside the State.

"Probate" is defined in the Act as "the copy of a will certified under the seal of a Court of competent jurisdiction with a grant of administration to the estate of the testator."

(Section 2 (f) ).

S. 232 of the Act enacts that letters of administration with the Will annexed may be granted to an universal or a residuary legatee of so much of the estate as may be unadministered. Chapter II of the Act containing S.237 to 247 deals with cases of limited grants, limited in point of duration, and S.248 to 254 provide for grants for special purposes and S.255 and 256 pertain to grants subject to an exception. When a grant subject to an exception has been made, the person entitled to probate or administration of the remainder of the deceased's estate may take a grant of probate or letters of administration, as the case may be, of the rest of the deceased's estate. (Section 257).

These sections deal with cases where even when the Court has jurisdiction to grant a