The story revolves around the unnatural death of a young woman named Manikyam (Mythili) in Paleri, a small village in northern Kerala, in the late 1950s. Although it was claimed by her in-laws that she died after she had a seizure, examination of the body revealed it to be a case of murder. The police charged three locals with the murder, only to be released by the court which described the prosecution's case as flawed. With no further investigation, the case had, since then, gone cold over the years, eventually acquiring the status of an unsolved mystery.