The first three general elections in Independent India (1952, 1957 and 1962) were largely peaceful, including in West Bengal. However, by the 1967 elections, with the politics of the country in churn, things began to change. Political tensions rose, organised violence became more frequent, and within a few years, large parts of West Bengal had descended into what the Election Commission later described as a “reign of terror”.

The period between 1967 and 1972 marked a turning point in West Bengal’s politics. Violence entered electoral politics in a sustained way and continued for decades after.

Several political shifts took place before the 1967 elections. The Congress split in West Bengal and the Bangla Congress was formed. The Communist Party, too, split in 1964 into the CPI and the CPI(M). In the 1967 Assembly elections, the Congress won 127 seats, the Bangla Congress 34, the CPI(M) 43 and the CPI 16.

Ajoy Mukherjee of Bangla Congress became chief minister. After his government fell, Prafulla Chandra Ghosh, an independent MLA, took over as CM. Frequent defections and unstable coalitions — a trend visible in other states too — led to repeated mid-term elections in West Bengal in 1969, 1971 and 1972. The year 1967 also saw the birth of the Naxalite movement in Naxalbari. Together, political instability and radical violence changed the nature of elections in the........

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