Moscow ? Tens of thousands of Russians protested across the country Saturday against a law replacing transportation and medical benefits for pensioners with cash payments, but were countered by massive rival demonstrations organized by pro-Kremlin forces.

The Communist-backed protest calling for the government’s ouster was the most widespread in President Vladimir Putin’s five years in power. It was also the first time that pro-Putin groups took to the streets over the reform.

The overhaul, which took effect Jan. 1, replaces cherished benefits like free transportation for pensioners and other groups with cash payments that many say are sorely inadequate. The reform has dented Putin’s popularity and on Thursday prompted an unsuccessful Communist-led no-confidence vote in parliament against the government.

An Interior Ministry spokesman said nearly 240,000 Russians demonstrated across the country, but said the ministry did not have a breakdown between the pro- and anti-Putin rallies. A Communist Party official claimed that the anti-Putin protests drew more than 200,000 nationwide.

In Moscow, some 3,000 people, mostly elderly pensioners, gathered under red hammer-and-sickle flags near a statue of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin on the edge of downtown, calling for the replacement of Russia’s leadership.

“The state has robbed us, we are outraged!” said Nina Gulicheva, 80, banging a wooden spoon against a metal pot. “I voted for Putin, but now I bitterly regret it and want to take back my vote.”

Across the Moscow River, a much larger crowd organized by the main pro-Kremlin party United Russia marched down the capital’s main street in support of Putin — part of the major effort to counter the nationwide Communist protests, which had been announced weeks in advance.

Demonstrators held signs saying “Putin, we are with you!” and “Communists, stop fooling grandmothers!”

Many demonstrators said they had been bused to the rally from Moscow suburbs. Kirill, an 18-year-old student who declined to give his last name, said he and his friends had been promised movie tickets by the organizers if they showed up.

“These rallies show the presidential administration is very much afraid of the tendency of Putin’s rating falling,” said Andrei Piontkovsky, head of the Center for Strategic Studies, a think tank. “The current political system hangs only (by) this thin thread of Putin’s political rating.”