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Journo taken from home
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herself, according to the report.
The report made the DC angry, said Ariful’s colleagues, adding that Ariful, 36, also wrote several other reports on alleged irregularities by the district administration.
Talking to The Daily Star, Ariful’s wife Mitu said they were about to go to sleep around 11:45pm on Friday when “seven to eight Ansar members, accompanied by two to three magistrates” stormed into their home and started beating her husband.
“When I tried to protect my husband, they threatened to beat me up as well,” she said.
“When I asked them what did my husband do, they didn’t give me any answer. At one stage, they handcuffed my husband and dragged him out of the home. He was taken to the DC office, where he was beaten up again,” Mitu said.
She alleged that Ariful was tortured as he wrote on corruption and irregularities by the district administration, involving the DC. “This is why the DC is angry with my husband.”
She feared Ariful might be tortured in jail as well.
Quoting Mitu, Bangla daily Prothom Alo reported that while beating up Ariful, one of the men said, “You are causing disturbance”.
Contacted, DC Sultana said a drive was conducted on Ariful’s house in Kurigram town’s Vocational intersection area around 12:10am yesterday. During the drive, the taskforce members found a bottle of alcohol and 150gram marijuana in Ariful’s possession, which is why he was arrested.
Later, the mobile court sentenced him one year in jail, she said.
She termed the allegation against her baseless and claimed that she was not aware of the drive beforehand.
Talking to this correspondent, local lawmaker (Kurigram-2 constituency) Panir Uddin Ahamed claimed Ariful was implicated in a false case.
He also said he would discuss “different irregularities of the DC” in parliament.
Meanwhile, Farhad Hossain, state minister for the public administration ministry, said the divisional commissioner of Rangpur was asked to look into the incident. “Necessary steps would be taken within a day or two,” he said, reports Prothom Alo.
CONFUSION OVER THE DRIVE
The Prothom Alo also reported that the district administration and officials of the Department of Narcotics Control (DNC) at Kurigram district office came up with contradictory statements about the anti-narcotics drive on Ariful’s home.
DC Sultana said the drive was conducted as asked by the DNC. “The taskforce conducted the raid as usual. A magistrate from the district administration, some police members, five Ansar members and three members of narcotics department constituted the team which carried out the drive,” she said.
Abu Zafar, assistant director of DNC’s Kurigram office, said he was not in the area when Ariful was arrested. He said he came to know about the drive from one of his colleagues -- Inspector Zahid -- only around noon yesterday.
“Zahid told me that he was asked by the district administration to join the drive on Friday night,” said Abu Zafar, reports Prothom Alo.
PROTEST
In a joint statement, Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists (BFUJ) and Dhaka Union of Journalists (DUJ) expressed concern over Ariful’s arrest.
They also voiced concern over several recent incidents of harassment and repression on journalists.
“A vested quarter is trying to create a rift between journalists and the government,” said the statement.
Kurigram Press Club General Secretary Ataur Rahman Biplob said, “We demand Ariful’s unconditional release. We will continue the protest if he is not released in 24 hours,” he said.
Leaders of BFUJ and DUJ threatened a tough movement if the demand was not met.
JAILING ILLEGAL: TIB
Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) yesterday termed illegal the jailing of Ariful at midnight, saying such a blatant misuse of a law goes against the constitutional commitment of rule of law and is tantamount to ignoring the press freedom.
In a statement, it said people would lose confidence in the administration and the government if those involved in such a despicable incident is not investigated immediately.
Referring to news reports published in the media, TIB Executive Director Dr Iftekharuzzaman said, “There are specific rules and directives from the highest court on running mobile courts in the country. According to those, it is illegal to run a mobile court after picking up any citizen from home at night.”
(Our Lalmonirhat correspondent contributed to this report)

Italians in China caught between two epidemics
Afp, Beijing
Sara Platto’s mother in Italy called her “crazy” for staying in Wuhan even as the virus-hit city was quarantined in January. Now she’s offering advice to people back home on how to cope.
Platto, who lives with her 12-year-old son at the epicentre of the coronavirus pandemic, rejected four offers of evacuation from the Italian government after refusing to abandon her two cats and deciding it was safe enough to stay in China.
“It’s not Ebola,” Platto, who works at Jiangnan University, told AFP.
She has spent more than 50 days cooped up at home, taking turns with her son to use one computer for online classes and work.
Italians enduring China’s health crisis and draconian measures that have left them effectively housebound for weeks now find themselves watching similar scenes unfold at home.
Italy -- where the virus has killed more than 1,000 people in just over two weeks, making it the hardest-hit country outside China where over 3,100 have died -- has imposed a lockdown unprecedented in Western Europe.
All stores except for pharmacies and food shops have been closed and residents are to stay at home except to travel to work, shop for provisions, or seek medical help.
“They are freaking out, because it’s something they’re not used to,” Platto said of people in her home city of Brescia in the northern region of Lombardy, where most of Italy’s infections have been detected.
“What I’m saying to everybody is don’t panic, because panic is worse than a virus.”
Platto’s Chinese neighbours in Wuhan were touched by her decision to stay in the city, where the virus was first detected in December and has been cut off from the world with no air transport since January 23.
They brought her a “big bag of spaghetti” and a note that said “Sara, be strong” after learning that she was from Italy.
But as the number of infections in China falls while overseas outbreaks continue to grow, Chinese authorities have stepped up surveillance of foreigners for fear of imported cases.
Beijing on Wednesday ordered all international arrivals to the city to go into 14-day quarantine, while airline passengers from Italy, Iran, South Korea and Japan are being handled separately from other travellers.
In one central Beijing district, neighbourhood volunteers and police repeatedly demanded information from Italians specifically, including making unannounced house calls, even for people who had not left China recently.
Francesco Abbonizio, a youth football coach in the capital, spent the first two weeks of his time on a recent trip to Italy avoiding social contact -- and now has to quarantine himself again after returning to China on Wednesday.
“Someone in my family was very scared of the virus and refused to meet me even after the two weeks,” he said.
“Right now all of them are locked down in their house.”
Marco, a Beijing resident working in the theatre industry, has not left China since the start of the outbreak and cancelled a planned trip home to Italy in March, his first in over two years.
He said he did not want to “create panic” arriving from China in his Tuscan hometown of only 16,000 people with his wife, who is Chinese.
“People are not always so good at rationalising things,” he told AFP, adding that he did not want his family to endure any negative reaction from other residents of his hometown.
Before Italy confirmed its first cases of the virus, Chinese communities in the country said they faced racist behaviour.
Chinese tourists were spat at in Venice, a family in Turin was accused of carrying the disease, and mothers in Milan used social media to call for Italian children to be kept away from Chinese classmates.
“I am worried more for my family actually,” Marco said, “and about the poor sense of community that my country is having lately.”