Statement given from DB office not voluntary: Coordinators

The statement given by six coordinators of the Anti-discrimination Student Movement from the Detective Branch (DB) of police custody was not voluntary, the coordinators claimed. 

The six coordinators, Nahid Islam, Sarjis Alam, Hasnat Abdullah, Abu Baker Majumdar, Asif Mahmud and Nusrat Tabassum, made the claim through a joint statement released Friday. 

According to the statement, the coordinators were forcibly picked up and taken to the DB office from several locations on 26, 27 and 28 July. They were then detained at the DB office for a week to keep them isolated from the movement. 

The coordinators claimed that the statement they gave from the DB office was coerced. They were forced to sit at the dining table to record a video. Their guardians were made to wait for 13 hours with the assurance that they would be released. They were not allowed to meet their teachers. 

"Us and our families were harassed, tortured, and dramatized for the last seven days," the statement said, expressing condemnation and protest of this treatment. 

The six coordinators gave a statement from the DB office on 29 July, withdrawing all programmes of the Anti-discrimination Student Movement.