Three people were arrested on Saturday in Bihar’s Nalanda, three days after a 54-year-old man was forced to lick his own saliva off the floor as punishment for entering the village head’s house without knocking. A case had been filed on Friday against eight people.

Earlier, the Bihar administration had ordered an investigation into the incident. The administration had taken suo motu cognisance of the incident after videos of the act were circulated. The clips also showed some women beating the man, Mahesh Thakur, with slippers.

The incident took place on October 18 in Ajaipur village of Noorsarai block in Nalanda, the home district of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

Thakur, who belongs to the barber community, had gone to Sarpanch Surendra Yadav’s house for tobacco, but there were no men in the house at that time, Nalanda District Magistrate SM Thiyagarajan had said.