ORDER :- This is a petition by the 1st accused in a preliminary inquiry case, P.R.C. No. 2 of 1955 on the file of the Additional First Class Magistrate, Bandar, to revise the order of the Magistrate dismissing an application made by the petitioner and his co-accused under Section 540, Criminal Procedure Code. The application was for summoning and examining as Court witnesses ten persons, who had been cited as direct witnesses in the police charge-sheet and who had been given up by the Assistant Public Prosecutor at the inquiry. It appears that the Assistant Public Prosecutor gave them up on the ground that they turned hostile. But it was alleged in the application that they were given up with an oblique motive and that they were more important direct witnesses than those actually examined by the prosecution, almost all of whom were interested as they belong to the Kamma community. The Magistrate dismissed the application on the ground that the accused ought to examine the ten persons as defence witnesses.

2. The preliminary inquiry in this case is governed by the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code prior to the Amendment Act XXVI of 1955. The learned counsel for the petitioner

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