At least 200 school teachers and postal workers in Moscow have alleged they were forced to attend a rally in support of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s presidential election campaign.

Russia’s Public Chamber, a monitoring body with no powers which oversees the government and parliament, said it had received 200 complaints of coercion.

The body said callers – most of them school teachers but also 13 postal workers – “named different mechanisms of coercion.”

“Somebody was promised a day-off, somebody a bonus; others were threatened with dismissal or penalties,” the chamber said in a statement on Tuesday.

Police said 140,000 people were at the demonstration on February 4, but independent media said attendance was much lower.

The rally’s organizing committee earlier acknowledged that some people had been told to attend, but said it was at local officials’ “own initiative.”

Putin also said reports of coercion could be true.

The rally took place at the same time as up to 120,000 demonstrators marched through part of central Moscow in protest at Putin’s expected return to the presidency next month.

Demonstrators called for a rerun of December’s disputed parliamentary election and urged “not one vote for Putin” at the March 4 vote.

A new protest rally is planned for February 26.