Kindergarten teachers detained for 'ear pulling'

Two female kindergarten teachers in east China's Zhejiang Province have been detained by police for pulling the ears of a student "for fun," according to a local government announcement on Thursday.

The duo triggered public uproar after a picture showing one of them, surnamed Yan, holding up a male student by his ears was posted on the Internet on Wednesday.

The child in the picture was seen crying with his face twisted in pain. Yan, who was seen smiling in the image, reportedly said she did it "just for fun."

Waves of criticisms surged as the picture was widely reposted in cyberspace.

Yan was detained on suspicion of provoking a disturbance, said a statement issued by the publicity office of the Wenling City government in Zhejiang.

The statement said another teacher, surnamed Tong, who took the picture with her camera and uploaded it onto the Internet, has been put under a seven-day administrative detention.

The Blue Peacock Kindergarten, where the incident happened, was ordered to rectify its practices.

"Whether it will be closed down depends on how the rectification goes," the statement said.

Local education authorities have also ordered teachers of the kindergarten to apologize to every family of students in the class in which the incident took place.

The scandal came just a few days after a female teacher in north China's Shanxi Province slapped a five-year-old kindergarten girl in the face.

She was put under a 15-day administrative detention by the police after a video of her hitting the girl repeatedly for more than 10 minutes was recorded by a surveillance camera and later released by local media.