The trial in the high-profile Kerala Assembly ruckus case is set to begin on November 3, eleven years after the incident had taken place.

The trial will be conducted before the Thiruvananthapuram Chief Judicial Magistrate Court.

The incident had taken place on March 13, 2015, during the tenure of the then United Democratic Front (UDF) government. The Assembly witnessed unprecedented scenes when the Opposition Left Democratic Front (LDF) attempted to prevent the then Finance Minister K.M. Mani from presenting the Budget, leading to a confrontation of the floor of the House.

According to the police case, the members of the Opposition allegedly entered the Speaker’s podium and damaged Assembly property, including chairs, computers, microphones and electronic panels. The case was registered by the Museum Police, with the alleged damage estimated at nearly ₹2.2 lakh.

Former Ministers V. Sivankutty, E.P. Jayarajan and K.T. Jaleel, and former MLAs K. Ajith, K. Kunhammed and C.K. Sadasivan are among the accused in the case.

In the first phase of the trial, the court will examine two witnesses including the then Assembly secretary P.D. Sarangadharan, the first prosecution witness. The prosecution has also identified an engineer, who copied the digital video recorder footage of the proceedings, as another witness.

The case has gone through a prolonged legal battle over whether the proceedings could be withdrawn. When the LDF was in power, the State government had approached both the Thiruvananthapuram Chief Judicial Magistrate Court and the Kerala High Court seeking withdrawal of the case. However, the petitions were not allowed. The Supreme Court also rejected the State’s appeal in 2021.

The Crime Branch subsequently completed further investigation and submitted its report within 81 days. As the further investigation did not reportedly yield any new information, the trial will proceed on the basis of the chargesheet that had already been filed.