Chandigarh: Five Dalit boys aged between 8 and 10 years were disrobed and paraded naked across a three kilometre field in a village in Amritsar for stealing a few radishes from the field.

Punjab Police have registered a case against the accused farmer after a video of the five minor boys narrating their ordeal went viral on Wednesday.

“We were running after a kite when we entered his field and felt hungry. We saw some radishes and started eating them standing on the field. This is when the farmer saw us and beat us up,” narrated one of the boys.

The incident took place at Sohian Kala village of Amritsar on Tuesday afternoon, when the five boys were apprehended by the farmer. He then beat them up, disrobed them and made them run across the entire 3 kilometre stretch of the field.

The accused has been absconding ever since the matter came to light and the video went viral on social media. Police have registered a case under Sections 341 (punishment for wrongful restraint), 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt) and 295A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings).

Police sources said, the poor families that these kids belong to, have raised concerns over the insensitivity of the accused farmer as the weather was quite cold and it was also raining when he chose to disrobe them. He didn’t even return their clothes when they were finally relieved.

“We were not returned our clothes and were made to run for 3 kilometres without anything on. It was a passerby who covered us with some cloth. Later, the farmer’s father came over to return our clothes,” said an 8-year-old who was one of the victims.

The passerby who rescued the boys and took them home also made the video of the children narrating their ordeal, which later went viral on the Internet.