The High Court has jurisdiction under Section 30 of the Rajasthan High Court Ordinance to entertain an application for guardianship or custody of a minor who is within the State of Rajasthan provided no application under Section 9 (1) or Section 25 of the Guardians and Wards Act, 1890 can be made with respect to the guardianship or custody of the minor anywhere in India.

K. N. WANCHOO, C. J.

( 1 ) THIS is an application by Keshawanand Gupta under Section 30 of the Rajasthan high Court Ordinance (No. 15 of 1949) (hereinafter called the Ordinance) praying that orders be passed directing the opposite parties to return the minor vinodkumar alias Ismail to the custody of the applicant. It is not necessary for present purposes to set out the facts pleaded in the application. It is enough to say that the application is being opposed by the opposite parties and a preliminary point as to the jurisdiction of this Court to entertain this application has been raised. We are at present concerned with this preliminary point relating to jurisdiction.

( 2 ) THE brief facts, which are necessary to determine this question, are these. The applicant, Keshawanand Gupta is a resident of Mirpur, Jammu Kashmir, but was residing at Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh when the present application was made by him. The opposite parties are said to be husband and wife and were, at the time the application was made, confined in the Central Jail at Jaipur. They are Pakistan nationals, but were said to be visiting Jaipur when the application was made. The minor Vinod Kumar alias Ismail was with the opposite parties in Jaipur when the application was made. The applicant contends that as the minor was within the jurisdiction of this Court when the application wan made and is so even now, this Court has jurisdiction under Section 30 of the Ordinance to pass necessary orders in the matter. It may be mentioned that the applicant had applied to the District Judge, Jaipur, under Section 25 of the Guardians and Wards Act (No. 8 of 1890), hereinafter called the Act, but withdrew that application as there was doubt about the jurisdiction of the District Judge.

( 3 ) SECTION 30 of the Ordinance is as follows :

"the High Court shall have power and authority with respect to the persons and estates of infants, idiots and lunatics within the State, subject to the provisions of any law for the time being in force. "

( 4 ) THE contention of the applicant is that the power of the High Court is not hampered by the restrictions contained in Sections 9 and 25 of the Act and it is open to the High Court to take action under Section 30 of the Ordinance if the minor is within this State. On the other hand, learned counsel for the opposite-parties contends that the power under Section 30 of the Ordinance is subject to the provisions of any law for the time being in force and, there-tore, the High court has no wider power than that conferred on the Court under the Act. We have, therefore, to determine the scope of this Courts jurisdiction under Section 30 of the Ordinance and the precise meaning of the words "subject to the provisions of any law for the time being in force", which appear in that section.

( 5 ) SECTION 9 of the Act provides for the Court which has jurisdiction to entertain an application under it. It lays down that if the application is with respect to the guardian of the person of the minor, it shall be made to the District Court having jurisdiction in, the place where the minor ordinarily resides.

( 6 ) SECTION 25 gives power to the Court to make an order for delivery of the minor into the Custody of the guardian in case the ward leaves or is removed from the custody of the guardian, if such order will be for the welfare of the ward The jurisdiction under Section 25 is in the Court and the Court is defined under Section 4 (5) as meaning the District Court having jurisdiction to entertain an application under this Act for an order appointing or declaring a person to be guardian. Thus, reading Sections 4 (5), 9 and 25 together, it will be apparent that the jurisdiction under the Act is in the District Court, whether the application is under section 9 or Section 25 and the minor must be ordinarily resident in a place over which the District Court has jurisdiction. The jurisdiction, therefore, of the Court under the Act is circumscribe