When World War II broke out in September 1939 the LSSP opposed the "second imperialist war". The LSSP played a major role in a wave of strikes in 1939/40 and consequently it was proscribed in 1940 and its leaders Colvin R. de Silva, Philip Gunawardena, Perera and Samarakkody arrested in June 1940. Goonewardene evaded arrest and went into hiding. The quartet were imprisoned at Welikada Prison but after staging a hunger striker they were transferred to Bogambara Prison. The four LSSP leaders, aided by sympathetic prison guards, escaped from Bogambara on 7 April 1942 and whilst de Silva, Gunawardena and Perera fled to India Samarakkody went into hiding in Ceylon. In India the LSSP leaders merged their party with the Bolshevik Leninist Party of the United Provinces and Bihar and the Bolshevik Mazdoor Party of India to create the Bolshevik–Leninist Party of India, Ceylon and Burma (BLPI) in April 1942 with the LSSP as its Ceylonese branch. De Silva, Gunawardena and Perera were arrested by the Indian police in 1943 after being betrayed by Stalinist called Shukla and deported back to Ceylon. Other LSSP members (Hector Abhayavardhana, Doric de Souza, Leslie Goonewardene, Vivienne Goonewardene, V. Karalasingham, Allan Mendis and Bernard Soysa) stayed behind in India to build up the BLPI. Samarakkody was re-arrested in 1944. De Silva, Philip Gunawardena, Perera and Samarakkody were prosecuted, convicted and sentenced to six months in prison. Samarakkody lost his civic rights and his license to practice law was suspended for two years. Towards the end of World War II in 1945 Gunawardena and Perera broke from the BLPI and resurrected the LSSP as a separate party. De Silva, Leslie Goonewardene, Samarakkody and Soysa remained in the BLPI. Samarakkody's civic rights had not been re-instated after the end of the war but the government amended the law which allowed Samarakkody to contest parliamentary elections. Samarakkody stood as the BLPI candidate in Mirigama at the 1947 parliamentary election but on was defeated by D. S. Senanayake, leader of the United National Party and future Prime Minister. In 1948 the BLPI merged with the Congress Socialist Party to create the Socialist Party. The BLPI's Ceylon branch became a separate party, the Bolshevik Samasamaja Party (BSP). The BSP and LSSP merged in 1950. Philip Gunawardena, who opposed the merger, left the LSSP and founded the Viplavakari Lanka Sama Samaja Party (VLSSP). Samarakkody stood as the LSSP candidate in