They got off Busses in the city of Cat Sina.

Many of them appeared to be barefoot and were wrapped in blankets.

After a week long ordeal, gunmen on motorbikes had raided the government Science Secondary school in the town of Cannes.

Kara, in Katsina state, on more than 300 of them were marched into a vast forest, authorities say Security services rescued them on Thursday.

However, many details surrounding the incidents remain unclear, including who was responsible, whether a ransom was paid, how the boys released was secured and whether all of them are now safe.

One boy, who did not give his name, said the captors had told him to describe them as members of the Islamist militant group Boko Haram, although he suspected they were armed bandits.

Speaking to Nigeria's Arise television, he said quote.

They beat us morning every night.

We suffered a lot.

Another told Reuters that they had barely been fed.

They hit us all in the same place when they took us a first, but when they saw a jet fighter they changed the location and hit us in a different place.

They gave us food, but it was very little.

The abduction has gripped the country, already racked by widespread insecurity.

It brought back painful memories of Boko Haram's 2014 kidnapping of more than 270 schoolgirls in the northeastern town of Chibok.

Any Boko Haram involvement in this kidnapping and Katsina state with market geographical expansion in its activities from its base in northeast Nigeria.