Three devotees were arrested and sent to jail on Wednesday on the charge of violating prohibition in the state.

Amardeep Singh, Hakam Singh and Narendra Singh were caught with liquor bottles at the Gandhi Maidan tent city in Patna late on Tuesday night.

While Amardeep is a native of Bhatinda in Punjab, Hakam Singh is a resident of Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh. Narendra Singh hails from Sidharth Nagar in neighbouring Uttar Pradesh.

Amit Anand, in-charge of Gandhi Maidan tent city temporary police station, said two bottles of foreign liquor were seized from the possession of Amardeep, Narendra and Hakam.

The police said an FIR has been lodged under relevant sections of the Excise and Prohibition Act, 2016, on the statement of a police officer on duty.

The three devotees had come from their respective states to take part in the ongoing Prakash Utsav.

Though the arrested devotees pleaded innocence, the cops deployed at the tent city police station refused to entertain their pleas. Later, senior police officers were apprised of the seizure of the liquor bottles and they were arrested later.

A luggage scanner has been installed at the tent city to ascertain whether any devotee was carrying with him/her bottles of liquor. In addition, CCTV cameras had been installed at different locations to keep an eye on drinking.

This is for the first time when action has been initiated against devotees for violating the prohibition ever since the Prakash Utsav celebrations began on December 30. It would conclude on January 8.

On December 5, a Class XII student's Facebook picture post with a half-consumed whisky bottle led to him and four of his friends being arrested in chief minister Nitish Kumar's home district of Nalanda.