A trader was allegedly kidnapped from a crowded Burrabazar locality and whisked away in an ambulance on Thursday afternoon.

Pradip Khandelwal, 55, a resident of Purbachal Main Road in Garfa, went missing from Bangur Building in Burrabazar, where he had gone with a neighbour whom he owed money.

Khandelwal, who worked for a deposit mobilising firm and runs a cell phone shop near the Dhakuria flyover, had taken a loan of Rs 4 lakh from neighbour Manik Nandi Majumdar, police said.

“Khandelwal and Mazumdar had come to Bangur Building. The trader asked Majumdar to wait on the ground floor and went upstairs apparently to collect money (to repay the debt),” said Ghosh.

Majumdar, a Congress leader in south Calcutta and retired government employee, told the police that the trader called him a few minutes after going upstairs, saying three armed men had kidnapped him and whisked him away in an ambulance.

A few minutes later, Khandelwal’s wife Neeru apparently heard a similar tale from her husband over the phone. “She said her husband told her that he had been kidnapped and was being taken to Kanchrapara (in North 24-Parganas). She alerted Garfa police station and was asked to contact Burrabazar police station. The case was later registered with Jorasanko police station, as the spot from where Khandelwal had allegedly been kidnapped falls under its jurisdiction,” the police said.

Sleuths, however, doubt the authenticity of Khandelwal’s claim for several reasons. “If someone is kidnapped by three armed persons, how come he still had access to his cell phone?” wondered a cop.

“By tracking the tower location we have come to know that he was in Calcutta around the time he had called his wife and said he was being taken to Kanchrapara. Besides, though the area around Bangur Building at the MG Road-Rabindra Sarani crossing is congested, we haven’t come across anyone who saw the abduction.”

Till late on Thursday, Khandelwal’s family had not received any ransom call.