China's top legislature voted on Friday to remove a deputy from the National People's Congress (NPC).

Song Dexi, former director of Urumqi Railway Bureau, was kicked out of the legislature because he was suspected of committing serious crimes, the fourth session of the 11th NPC Standing Committee revealed on Friday as it closed.

Song's removal was proposed by the Standing Committee of the People's Congress of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, northwest China on July 31.

Song was investigated in March when the 11th NPC was held in Beijing.

He was suspected of corruption to the tune of 24 million yuan (3.5 million U.S. dollars) and 100,000 U.S. dollars, accepting bribes of more than one million yuan (146,000 U.S. dollars) and power abusing involving 16 million yuan (2.3 million U.S. dollars), according to a report published Friday on the website of Caijing magazine.

Some local officials who were in close contact with Song have also been investigated, Caijing said.

Born in 1963 in Pingdu City in east China's Shandong Province, Song began to work in the bureau after graduation from college in 1986 and promoted director of the bureau in 2005.

The 11th NPC now has 2,986 deputies, who hold a five-year tenure. Members of the NPC cannot be prosecuted, and for any prosecution to go ahead they must first be removed from their post.