A 22-year-old Delhi-based Youtuber was arrested on Monday night for allegedly extorting ₹80 lakh from a man by threatening to implicate him in a fake rape case.

The woman’s husband, who was also involved in the case , is on the run, police said.

A 21-year-old man, a Gurugram resident at the Sector 50 police station on August 22 filed a complaint in this regard.

A police officer said YouTuber and her husband had purchased jewellery worth more than ₹10 lakh and costly household appliances allegedly using the money that they extorted from the 21 -year-old man.

“We have recovered the household appliances but are still searching for the jewellery,” said the officer.

According to police, the 21-year-old man had worked in Dubai and opened an advertising firm after returning to Gurugram. He came in contact with the YouTuber at a five-star hotel in Sector 49 last year and wanted to use her YouTube channel for advertising purposes, police said.

The complainant told the police that the YouTuber and her husband took him to a party in December last year, where they got him drunk and later took him to a hotel.

At the hotel the next day, when they woke up, the YouTuber allegedly told him to pay her money else she would get him implicated in a rape case, police said.

“The YouTuber has extorted ₹80 lakh from the 21-year-old till now in connivance with her husband. It started in December last year,” the police said.

The matter came to fore when the 21-year-old withdrew ₹5 lakh from his father’s bank account when his share of the property sale money got exhausted, police said.

“The whole issue came to the family’s knowledge and they questioned him. He disclosed that he had fallen victim to blackmailing, after which his father brought him to the police and made him file a complaint,” said Kumar.

Police said notices were served to the couple three times to join the investigation. However, the couple never contacted police and filed anticipatory bail petitions in a Gurugram court, which were rejected on November 18.

FIR was registered under sections 34 (common intention), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison), 388 (extortion by threat of accusation of offence punishable with death, life or 10 years), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code on November 24, said police.