A tobacco merchant kidnapped at gunpoint while returning to his Bangur Avenue home on Wednesday night was found several hours later with his hands tied and face masked inside an SUV that had stopped for a routine police check in West Burdwan, 250km from the city.

Manoj Khandelwal was being taken to a hideout at Lakhisarai in Bihar as part of a plan to hold him hostage for ransom, investigators said.

He had been kidnapped by four men from near Maniktala in north Calcutta around 10.45pm. “Khandelwal was going back home from his Girish Park office when his car was obstructed by another. A gun-wielding man stepped out and asked his driver to follow the other vehicle. After both cars reached Maniktala, the kidnappers shifted him to their vehicle and sped away,” a police officer said.

Khandelwal’s driver drove to Girish Park police station moments later to report the kidnapping.

A team from the Asansol-Durgapur police commissionerate rescued the tobacco merchant and arrested four men after finding him inside the SUV during the check at Salanpur, close to the Bengal-Jharkhand border.

Investigators suspect he had been drugged before the journey.

The police seized three improvised pistols, two pipe guns, nine rounds of cartridges and two syringes from the accused. The SUV was also confiscated.

“We have rescued the businessman abducted from Calcutta. He was found in a vehicle with his hands tied and face covered. We have also seized three firearms, ammunition and two syringes from the accused,” Anamitra Das, additional deputy commissioner of police (west), said.

An officer in the Asansol-Durgapur police commissionerate said the arrested men had admitted to kidnapping Khandelwal for ransom.

Subhankar Sinha Sarkar, deputy commissioner of police (central division), said the merchant’s family never received a ransom call because he was rescued before the kidnappers could carry out the rest of the plan.

The four accused are from Lakhisarai and Mugma, a village in Jharkhand. They have been identified as Sivam Kumar, Karan Kumar and Gullu Kumar of Lakhisarai and Vivek Kumar of Mugma. All four have a criminal background, the police said.

The police could not immediately say if the quartet carried out the kidnapping on their own or were following orders.

A case under the Arms Act has been started against them at Salanpur police station.

The accused were produced in the Asansol district court on Thursday and remanded in judicial custody for two days.

Sources said Calcutta police would seek transit remand of the accused since Girish Park police station was investigating the kidnapping case.