Eyewitnesses said there were about 200 of them, most of them carrying arms, and alleged that some of them belonged to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), which is at the helm of affairs at the civic body.

The drama took place allegedly to favour a particular contractor and block the other contractors from the projects.

“Some goons and people with a criminal intent tried to block the tender procedure on Monday and stopped civic contractors from filing the tenders at the civic tender cell. Tenders had been invited for five different civic projects, running into Rs 100 crore and it was the last day of filing the tender application,” Municipal Commissioner Praveensinh Pardeshi said.

Asked whether the civic administration has filed any criminal case against them, Pardeshi said, “Based on the report and observations of our security personnel, we are going to file a criminal case.”

He said the security department of PMC has been asked to submit a report on the incident, as also the tender cell.

The drama started around 11 am on Monday when NCP workers including some corporators came to the tender cell on the ground floor of PMC headquarters. Hundreds of party workers shut the doors of the cell and prevented other contractors from entering the office. It created panic at the office and the personnel of the tender cell ran away.

An observer said party workers were seen shooing away those entering the tender cell corridor with the tender papers. When the security personnel knew about this, they came to the spot and finally managed to disperse the crowd to some extent. Eventually, the doors of the tender cell were opened at around 2 pm and a few contractors could file the tenders.