The main legal point established in the judgment is the procedural requirements and limitations for ordering police investigation under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, at the pre-cognizance stage, and the distinction between the pre-cognizance and post-cognizance stages.

P. K. TRIPATHY, J.

( 1 ) PETITIONERS are the accused persons in I. C. C. Case No. 47 of 1997 which merged with G. R. Case No. 274 of 1997 under the following facts and circumstances.

( 2 ) ON 2-5-1997, Ashema Bibi, Opposite Party No. 2, filed the complaint petition registered as I. C. C. Case No. 47 of 1997 in the Court of J. M. F. C. Salipur. In that complaint petition, she made allegations against her husband Abdul Jahangir (petitioner No. 1) and the other petitioners regarding demand of dowry and ill-treatment and torture for not fulfilling the dowry demand constituting the offences under Sections 498-A/323/506/34, I. P. C. and Section 4, Dowry Prohibition Act. On that date, learned Magistrate passed the impugned order which reads as hereunder-"order No. 1 dated 2-5-97: Complainant petition is filed through Advocate, Sri P. K. Kanungo and others. Register, Advocate for the complainant, stating that the complaint petition may be sent to O. I. C. Mahanga P. S. for necessary investigating treating the same as F. I. R. Heard. Perused the complaint petition. As it reveals that is a cognizable offence against the accused persons. The copy of the original complaint petition be sent to O. I. C. Mahanga P. S. for necessary investigation treating the same as F. I. R. and to submit F. F. to this Court on 9-7-97 as per provision u/s. 156 (3), Cr. P. C. "on 25-1-99, after completion of the investigation, charge-sheet for the above offences was filed in the case registered as G. R. Case No. 274/79 and on that date cognizance of those offences was taken by the learned J. M. F. C. With the above backdrop of facts in this application under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (in short 'the Code') prayer of the petitioners is as follows :-"it is therefore prayed that this Hon'ble Court may be graciously pleased to quash the order passed on "2-5-97 in complaint case I. C. C. No. 47/97, and the Crl. proceeding initiated in G. R. Case No. 274/97 arises out of I. C. C. No. 47/97; pending in the Court of J. M. F. C. Salipur, Cuttack. "

( 3 ) MR. Sk. Aziz, learned counsel for the petitioners, canvassed two points in support of his aforesaid prayer, viz:- (I) That the above quoted order in the complaint petition and the action thereof by the learned J. M. F. C. Salipur under Section 156 (3) of the Code is vitiated because of the Magistrate not complying with the mandatory requirement of law in Section 200 of the Code. In that context, substance of his submission is that even if learned Magistrate decided to forward the complaint petition inaccordance with the provision in sub-section (3) of Section 156 of the Code, yet, in view of the language used in Section 200, it was mandatory on the part of the learned Magistrate to examine the complainant and his witnesses (if such witnesses were present ). According to him, since the Magistrate sent the complaint petition for investigation without examining the complainant and recording her statement, the impugned order is vulnerable for breach of the mandatory provision of law in Section 200. Hence, he argued, the whole proceedings i. e. , both the complaint case and G. R. case are liable to be quashed. In that context, he relied on the decisions reported in 1976 Cri LJ 1517 (Shyama Prasanna Das Gupta v. State), 1987 (2) Crimes 400 (Ram Narain v. Lokuram); 1988 (1) Crimes 801 : (1989 Cri LJ NOC 96) (Venkatesh Nilappa Talwar v. Laxmavva and AIR 1977 SC 2401 : (1978 Cri LJ 8) (Tula Ram v. Kishore Singh ). (II) That there has been inordinate delay in filing the complaint inasmuch as the complaint petition discloses the occurrence to have taken place in the month of March, 1997 (15-3-1997) whereas, admittedly the complaint petition was filed on 2-5-97. Because of this delay, according to him learned Magistrate should have refused to take any action either under Section 156 (3) or under Chapter XV of the Code. In that respect, he referred to the decision of Kumari Gita Byas v. Smt. Surya Tanti, (