Five-year-old Indian boy Ariful Sheikh, who spent nearly a year in a Bangladesh jail along with his grandparents, was released on Sunday. Ariful was reunited with his parents after the Bangladesh Border Guards handed him along with his grandparents to the BSF at the Gede checkpost on the Indo-Bangladesh border early on Sunday morning.

Later, the BSF handed them over to Murshidabad police, BSF sources said.

Ariful, his grandfather Hachimuddin Sheikh (48) and grandmother Mafroza Khatun (about 40) had gone to Bangladesh, apparently to see his ailing great grandmother and were apprehended in April last year.

They were sentenced by a judicial magistrate court in Kushthia to two months in prison and ordered to be repatriated to India but had been languishing in jail even after their prison term was over.

Ariful's parents said they were happy that he is finally seeing his son.

"I am very happy and I thank everyone for their help and support," his mother said.