Police arrested a 27-year-old man on Thursday on extortion, breach of trust and forgery charges in connection with the sale of a jeep once used by the army to three people through OLX.

Police said Sanway Banerjee of Belghoria posted an ad on OLX, looking for prospective buyers for a jeep, which he claimed to have bought in an auction. He posted some photographs, too, the police said.

A serviceman was the first to respond in 2015. Banerjee convinced him that he was an automobile engineer who owned an automobile shop in Belghoria and was passionate about restoring discarded army jeeps, the police said.

Cops have found out that he extracted Rs 2 lakh from the armyman in instalments. When he didn't get the jeep, the soldier approached Banerjee's father, a bank manager, seeking refund, the police said.

He got back a part of the sum and chose not to report the matter to cops, a police source claimed.

An officer of Bidhannagar North police station said Banerjee duped complainant Rajshubhra Basu, a lawyer, into paying Rs 2 lakh for the jeep. Basu, however, got a jeep in a dilapidated state whose chassis number didn't match the one mentioned in the registration papers.

Shibasish Kushary, who works with a private airline, was the third person to fall prey to Banerjee's forgery, the officer said. He had shelled out Rs 4.4 lakh to get a restored army jeep.

The police said Kushary's case would be tagged with Basu's complaint.

A police team picked up Banerjee on Thursday night from his home in Belghoria.

A court on Friday sent him to three days' police custody.