Kochi, Dec 2 (PTI): The CBI on Thursday told a court here that former CPI(M) MLA K V Kunhiraman has been arraigned as an accused along with 4 others in connection with the killing of two Youth Congress workers at Periya in 2019. The submission was made in the court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM), Ernakulam, by the CBI while seeking judicial custody of the 5 CPI(M) workers the agency had arrested on Wednesday. The CJM court, allowing the CBI plea, sent the five arrested -- Hari Prasad A (31), Rajesh P alias Raju (38), Reji Varghese (43), A Surendran alias Vishnu Sura (47) and Madhu A alias Sastha Madhu (40) -- to 14 days judicial custody. The agency, in its remand report, said the offence committed by the arrested people includes criminal conspiracy to commit murder, supply of weapons for the murder and logistic assistance for commission of the offence. The accused are members of CPI(M) political party and they include a branch secretary, CBI told the court and added that since CPI(M) was the ruling party, the accused have high influence in society due to their political affiliation. "If the accused are released on bail, there is every possibility that they may influence the witnesses and hence tamper with the evidence which will adversely affect the outcome of the investigation/trial of the case," the agency said in its report. With the inclusion of senior CPI(M) leader Kunhiraman and four others in the list of accused, the number of accused in the case has gone up to 24. Of the 24, 19 were arrested and out of them 17, including the five arrested on Wednesday, are in judicial custody presently. On Wednesday, the five CPI(M) workers were arrested after their hours-long questioning revealed they were allegedly involved in collecting weapons, providing transport facilities and telling the assailants about the travel route of the victims -- Kripesh and Sarath Lal, a senior CBI officer said. The arrests came just two weeks before the expiry of the four months time given by the Kerala High Court to CBI to file a charge sheet in the case. PTI COR HMP HMP NVG NVG