South First meets the mother of the Walayar sisters, whose deaths in 2017 rocked the state. On 8 February, 2025, the CBI, in its chargesheet filed at a Kochi court, suggested that the sisters died by suicide.
Published Feb 20, 2025 | 5:00 PM ⚊ Updated Feb 20, 2025 | 5:00 PM
Instead of focusing on the merit of the case, Kerala is now discussing the morality of Bhagyavathi, the mother of the Walayar girls.
Synopsis: The CBI’s excessive focus on the morality of V Bhagyavathi, the mother of the Walayar sisters, may be a tactic to divert attention from the crux of the matter, say activists who are trying to bolster her legal defence
On 13 January, 2017, a 13-year-old girl was found hanging from a raft in her family’s one-room house at Attappallam, near Walayar, Palakkad district of Kerala.
Exactly 50 days later, on 4 March, her nine-year-old sister was found hanging from the same raft.
On 12 March that year, the post-mortem examination reports revealed the horrific truth: Both girls had been sexually abused.
The grim reality of the Walayar sisters’ tragedy shook Kerala, sparking outrage and calls for justice.
Yet, after eight years, on 8 February, 2025, the CBI, in its chargesheet filed at a Kochi court, suggested that the sisters died by suicide.
The most startling twist was that the parents of the girls were named as accused.
The CBI’s chargesheet has made explosive allegations against the mother — the chargesheet holds that the mother had sexual relations with the first accused and that she had sex in front of the children.
The chargesheet, based on the CBI’s enquiry that included both ground-level investigation and scientific analysis, has been submitted. However, further details remain unavailable at this time. As of now, the court has neither accepted nor rejected the chargesheet.
The parents will now face prosecution for all the crimes attributed to the prime accused — aggravated rape, unnatural sex, sexual assault of children, and penetrative sexual assault.
In the midst of this storm, V Bhagyavathi, the mother of the Walayar sisters, spoke to South First.
“Appu calls me every Sunday. He’s in the 9th grade and staying in a hostel in Ernakulam. Ever since the reports came out, my biggest challenge has been comforting him because he’s not a child anymore. He’s an adolescent. He saw the reports on TV and in the newspapers, accusing his parents of his sisters’ death. How could a child bear that?”
Bhagyavathi’s hope in life is Appu, her youngest child, the only surviving one of her three children.
“I complained about the murder. My children were raped. Am I the one who abused them? Am I the one who killed them? If I were such a bad woman, why did I send my children to convent school hostels for their studies?” she asked.
Bhagyavathi couldn’t read or write properly, but she knew one thing – she has been betrayed by the system.
While she lives with her husband now in a new house, the old shed where the family earlier lived, and where her daughters were found dead, is still being maintained as it was.
She continues to struggle to find a livelihood as an MGNREGA worker, but daily work is scarce.
“The payment for work already done is pending. Since 25 January, no amount has been credited to my account. Employment opportunities this year have been far fewer,” she says.
“I’m fighting a battle for my children, but one thing is certain, I won’t end my own life. If I step back, all the allegations will seem true. That will hurt my children. You need to look into how many POCSO (The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act) cases the Walayar police have acted upon,” she told South First.
“Many journalists and activists came here, and most of them took away photographs I had of my children. You know, I don’t even have a photo of my children with me now,” she said, crying.
CR Neelakantan of the Walayar Neethi Samara Samithi, (Committee for Walayar Justice) told South First that there are legal options that exist even now.
The inclusion of the victims’ parents in the CBI chargesheet, Neelakantan argued, was a means of harassment, meant to suppress their voices and tarnish the image of the mother of the victims to divert attention from the merits of the case.
The Walayar Samara Samithi received the charge sheet just two days ago and is currently reviewing its contents. They have chosen to remain silent for now, as legal options are still open. Meanwhile, the parents of the deceased Walayar girls, who face allegations of abetting the rape of their minor daughters, are likely to be summoned to the CBI court in Kochi soon.
He pointed out that in August 2022, the Palakkad POCSO court had rejected the CBI charge sheet, describing it as a “carbon copy of the police report”. That court had ordered a re-investigation by a fresh team.
Neelakantan pointed out that in the Sooryanelli and Kaviyoor rape cases, the investigation agencies attempted to involve families of the victims in the chargesheet to protect the culprits.
The police filed a chargesheet in the Palakkad POCSO court in June 2019, claiming the girls had died by suicide.
The five accused in the case included one minor and four adults.
Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the parents had actively agitated in front of the Secretariat, demanding action against the police officers who allegedly mishandled the case.
Neelakantan criticised the government’s response, noting that the sub-inspector was promoted to deputy superintendent of police, and the deputy SP to SP, with strong recommendations from political parties aiding their advancement.
He emphasised that while society may label the mother to win an argument, it does not change the fact that the case is about the tragic death of two young girls, not the morality of their mother.
A senior journalist, whose early reports on the case were widely praised, shared with South First, “During that time, I spoke to Bhagyavathi. She was constantly talking to the media, and everyone sought an exclusive interview with her. No one asked if she had had her meals – I would bring her food by evening.
The area where the home is located is riddled with vulnerabilities, characteristic of a borderland — dry, with cactus, rocks, and dust. The people there have diverse beliefs, politics, religions, and cultures, but they share one thing in common, poverty.
Even if the mother had extramarital affairs, does that mean she got her children raped and killed? My sympathies are with the children, but still, no one is asking the critical question, who abused them? Who took their lives? Discussions are being shifted away from the real issue.
As Dante once said, ‘The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.’”
Saranyamol KS, an independent journalist who developed a friendship with Bhagyavathi, told South First, “If the postmortem report of the elder girl had been made available on time, we might have been able to prevent the death of the younger one. It was only after both girls died that it was revealed they had been sexually abused. The elder girl was studying at a convent school and staying in the hostel. The younger girl was just 9 years old and looked like she was seven. How could she hang herself?”
In a conversation with South First, Neelakandan revealed that between 2016 and 2021, 42 POCSO cases were registered in Walayar, with over 36 involving Dalit children.
Only in 17 of these cases were culprits identified. So what happened in the remaining cases? Neelakandan backs the data he provides with information he managed to collect through Right to Information applications.
Saranyamol, the journalist cited earlier, also mentioned the suspicious deaths of children in this area.
She pointed out that the local police failed to collect proper evidence at the initial stage, not anticipating these cases would eventually be discussed nationwide.
Nearly two decades after taking over the 2004 Kaviyoor sexual assault case, the CBI has informed the Kerala High Court that it has hit a dead end and sought permission to close the investigation.
The case involves the deaths of a family of five in Kaviyoor, Kottayam, initially considered a suicide. However, a postmortem examination revealed that the elder daughter, aged 15, had been sexually assaulted before death.
Early CBI reports suggested the father, a temple priest, was responsible for the assault, but the court rejected these claims due to lack of evidence.
The CBI admitted that delays in receiving the case prevented crucial DNA evidence collection.
Multiple rejections of their reports by the Special CBI court delayed progress, and despite a 2020 court order to continue the investigation, the agency now cites the lack of leads to justify its request to close the case.
This marks another failure on the part of the CBI, leaving a glaring chapter of sexual assault and death unresolved in the history of Kerala.
(Edited by Rosamma Thomas)
