Three men were arrested in East Midnapore’s Egra early on Thursday for allegedly duping an elderly resident of Salt Lake of Rs 11 lakh by posing as executives of a cellular service provider, police said.

The arrest followed a complaint lodged by Manav Mehra, a resident of BG block in Salt Lake’s Sector II, with Bidhannagar East police station.

The three were picked up based on the statements of a fourth accused, who had been arrested on January 25, an officer of the Bidhannagar commissionerate said.

According to the complaint, Mehra’s father Amit had received a call in January and the caller introduced himself as an executive of a telecom service provider, the officer said.

The caller told Amit Mehra that his cellphone number would be blocked and his SIM card would be deactivated as he had not submitted some documents.

“The caller then asked Mehra to follow his instructions. Mehra received a link on his cellphone and the caller asked him to click on it and tell him the OTP that was sent to him,” the officer said.

After Mehra shared the OTP with the caller, Rs 11 lakh was withdrawn from his bank account.

An officer of the commissionerate said Mehra had been sent a link for a team-viewing app that let people control a cellphone or computer remotely.

“Once Mehra told the caller the OTP, he gained complete control of his cellphone and siphoned off the money from his bank account,” the officer said.

The three men who were arrested early on Thursday are Sougata Barapanda, Naba Kumar Patra and Shantanu Pradhan, alias Babu, all residents of Egra. Barapanda and Patra are distributors of a telecom service provider in Egra, while Pradhan sells SIM cards.

The cops had earlier arrested Asif Khan from West Burdwan in connection with the case.

A large number of pre-activated SIM cards have been recovered from the men. The SIM cards had been activated using forged documents, the officer said.