Dhaka Tribune journalist Ariful Islam has secured bail from the Additional District Magistrate's Court in Kurigram Sunday morning.
Immediately after, he was taken to Kurigram General Hospital to receive medical attention.
It is there that he described the details of the unnerving incident that took place in the early hours of Saturday.
Narrating the event, Arif said: “My family and I went to bed after dinner at midnight on Friday. All on a sudden, we heard knocks on the door. When I asked who’s there I didn’t get any response. So, I tried to reach the Sadar police OC over the phone. Hearing me trying to call the police, men led by Kurigram Senior Assistant Commissioner (Tax) Nazim Uddin broke into my home and started beating me. They bound my eyes, hands and feet and shoved me into a car.
"They proceeded to take me to an isolated place and Nazim kept on saying: 'Say your prayers now, you’re about to be encountered'.
"At that time I begged them to spare my life. I desperately told them: 'I have two children and my parents have passed away. Don't kill me or my children will become orphans too.
Photo shows bruised back of Dhaka Tribune journalist Ariful Islam | Dhaka Tribune
"I discovered that I was being taken to the DC office when I managed to peek through the blindfold a bit. Nazim Uddin and some others took me to a room. They took off my clothes and started beating me mercilessly while one of them said the incident was being filmed.
"At that time Nazim was repeatedly saying to someone 'Call DC sir, send a text, let me know what to do with him.'
"I kept asking them 'what's my crime?' Then Nazim replied 'you are disturbing us a lot, we will teach you journalism.' They sent me to jail that night after taking my signatures on four papers. They instructed the jail authorities so that I am not given any medical treatment or contacted by anyone for at least a month.
"An employee of the jail came to me on Saturday night and asked for my signature on a paper saying that my family filed a Vakalatnama [bail petition]. I have signed there but I don't know who sent it. Today [Sunday] I came to know that my family did not do so."
In the early hours of Saturday, Ariful Islam was assaulted and picked up from his home in Kurigram reportedly on charges of possessing half a bottle of local liquor and 150g of marijuana. Later in the night, a mobile court sentenced him to a year in prison.