A group of men barged into the office of a real estate developer in Sinthee in north Calcutta on Friday night and allegedly beat him up, broke a television set and left with cash amounting to close to a lakh after he refused to pay ₹5 lakh to them.

The attack took place inside the office of Abhijit Sarkar on Rajendra Roychowdhury Lane close to midnight.

Purported CCTV footage from the scene showed a group of men arriving on two-wheelers, entering the office and beating up Sarkar. One of the accused wore a green shirt and another yellow. There were several others.

Sarkar has been admitted to a private nursing home nearby and the CCTV footage has been handed over to police.

“Abhijit Mondal, alias Rana, has been demanding ₹5 lakh from me for removing a tenant from the plot, which is under development. He was trying hard so that the tenant didn’t reach any settlement with me,” Sarkar told reporters from his hospital bed.

“I had asked him to stay out of this and even told him I won’t pay him.”

On Friday, Sarkar and his business partner succeeded in reaching an agreement with the tenant and offered an alternative accommodation.

When Rana called an associate of the developer, he was told that a deal had been reached with the tenant. “Rana wanted to broker the deal and collect ₹5 lakh. When that hope was gone, he turned up with his men and attacked me and ransacked the office,” Sarkar said.

He also dragged in the name of Atin Ghosh, the deputy mayor of Calcutta. “Rana claimed to be close to Atin Ghosh and dropped the name of Jayanth Singh of Ariadaha. He kept saying he that no one could touch him.”

Ghosh, also the Trinamool MLA from the Cossipore-Belgachia Assembly constituency, said he wasn’t aware why his name was being dragged into this. “I would instruct the police to take strong steps against the accused.”

A resident of Gopal Chatterjee Road in Cossipore, Rana is a popular face in the locality and close to several Trinamool functionaries in the city’s north, the police said.

“Rana actively participates in different rallies, meetings and other works,” said a Cossipore resident.

Jayanth Singh, whom Rana mentioned, is another alleged Trinamool strongman whose name has cropped up in connection with assault and alleged extortion in recent times.

Jayanth was re-arrested a week ago for allegedly beating up a young man and his mother in Ariadaha with his aides.

On Saturday, Sarkar’s relative Tapas Majumder reached the office after receiving the news of the attack at night and took him to a nursing home nearby. “My brother had reached an agreement with the tenant on his own. The result was his office was ransacked, he was beaten up and the gang members left with cash from the office.”

He alleged that the goons claimed to be Trinamool supporters and lodged a complaint with Cossipore police station.

The police arrested two persons for their alleged involvement in the attack — Kanwaljit Shee and Jiten Kumar Pal, both residents of Sinthee.

“We are trying to identity others involved in the attack from the CCTV footage. More arrests are likely to happen soon,” a senior officer of the police station said.