From correspondents in Bihar, India, 08:30 PM IST

Brought to its senses following adverse media coverage, the Bihar Police Friday withdrew a charge against a three-month-old baby of looting a bus.

The child, Praveen Kumar, of Nehalpur village in Muzaffarpur district, was just one-and-a-half months old when he was named as one of the accused at the Meenapur police station of looting a commuter bus.

IANS was the first to report the case a week ago.

'Police have withdrawn the charge against the child after we came to know about it and found it was a fake case,' Inspector General of Muzaffarpur, Sunit Kumar, told IANS over phone Friday. He said that departmental action had been initiated against the concerned police officers.

When IANS reported the story, the Deputy Inspector General of the Tirhut range in Muzaffarpur, Gupteshwar Pandey, said he was unaware of the case.

Now police have also removed Praveen's name from the complaint.

'How could an infant, suckled by his mother, be made an accused in a criminal charge by police? We submitted his birth certificate issued by the local administration to the police, but they refused to remove his name from the complaint,' said Akal Rai, a relative.

In recent months, police in Bihar have charged a number of minors in criminal cases, evoking criticism even from the courts.

Six-year-old Bimal Kumari and eight-year-old Kamal Kumari were charged by the Bhojpur district police with assault, loot and abuse after two years of investigations. They were granted bail by a court that also rapped police.

A Patna court was shocked to hear the case of five-year-old Raj Kumar, who was charged for not only assaulting a woman but also attempting to molest her. The court dismissed the charges against him.

Police in Sasaram in Rohtas district booked a five-year-old boy on charges of pick pocketing. When it was found that the boy was not a pickpocket, the court ordered the police official responsible for his custody to pay him compensation and also apologise to him.

Rani Pandey, six, was charged by the Bhojpur district police of attacking them and helping her father escape from police custody.

(Staff Writer, © IANS)