The Kerala Assembly was adjourned on Monday, the opening day of the 16th session of the Assembly, after the controversial Walayar case was brought up by the Opposition.

On the day that five newly elected Members of the Legislative Assembly were sworn in, the Opposition sought an adjournment motion to discuss the case, in which two minor girls – sisters aged nine and 13 – who were sexually assaulted, were found dead in their home. A special court had on Friday acquitted the three accused in the case after the police failed to bring any evidence. This has sparked off a lot of outrage, and Congress MLA Shafi Parambil gave the adjournment notice to discuss the case.

“These things happen in north India but now this is in Kerala – in Walayar, Palakkad. The police haven’t been able to provide evidence because, as the papers say, it is the ‘sickle’ party people who got bail for the accused,” Shafi said.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that the government will file an appeal in the case. He said that if there was any failure on the part of the officials, it shall be looked into. It will be reinvestigated or handed over to the CBI as needed, but there is no need to adjourn the house for it, the CM said.

The five new MLAs – VK Prasanth, KU Jenish Kumar, TJ Vinod, Shanimol Usman and MC Kamaruddin – got sworn in before Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan, after the question hour. They were elected from the recent bye polls in the state. Two of the new MLAs belong to the ruling Left Democratic Front and the other three belong to the United Democratic Front. This is also the first day in office for new Pala MLA, Mani C Kappan, though he was sworn in earlier. 

The LDF now has 93 members, the UDF 45 and the NDA has one.

In January 2017, 13-year-old Malathi (name changed) was found dead in her house. Her dead body was found by her nine-year-old sister Rani (name changed). Two months later, on March 4, Rani too killed herself, leading to massive outrage in the state.