BEIJING: State media coverage of a routine visit to a home by China’s incoming premier Li Keqiang has become a colourful Internet sensation after a boy appeared on camera half-naked.

Internet users were on Thursday circulating the CCTV state television footage from the northern city of Baotou, cheering the rare unplanned blip in usually staid government-controlled coverage of officials’ tightly scripted trips.

Li — who is set to be promoted to national premier next month — was speaking with the man of the house in a modest bedroom when the boy popped out of a wardrobe behind them not wearing any underwear.

He quickly ducked under the blanket of a bed, exposing his buttocks to the cameras as he did so.

“The kid was having fun as if there was nothing special going on in front of him, it was amusing,” said one Internet user going by the name Hongtailang.

“It is rare to see this kind of image on TV.”

“It’s so nice when things are spontaneous and true!” said another user.

In a separate incident, Chinese authorities have detained a driver and a local government official on suspicion of causing the accidental death of a 13-month-old boy who was run over by a van during an argument between his parents and local officials demanding the couple to pay a fine for violating China’s strict family planning limits.

The boy was the rural couple’s third child. China limits most couples in the countryside to no more than two children.

The accident occurred after the mother was told to board the officials’ van, the statement said.

When she got into the vehicle, the father, who was holding the baby, also insisted on going.

The government official, identified by his family name of Bai, pushed away the father, closed the van door and told Cheng to drive off, the statement said.

The father dropped the baby, and a rear wheel ran over him.

Cheng immediately stopped, and the baby was rushed to a local hospital where he died, according to the statement.

The boy’s death is the latest incident to aggravate long-running public resentment over the country’s family planning limits and the use of aggressive enforcement measures such as beatings and forced abortions.