Congress, a splinter of the Bangla Congress. The election was marred widespread instances of violence against opposition parties, electoral discrepancies, irregularities in process and consequent allegations of rigging from both Congress (O) and the CPI-M, the press in Calcutta at the time reported that the rigging had occurred in around 50 constituencies. According to the socialist essayist Madhu Limaye, the "black art of booth rigging" was perfected by the Congress in the 1972 election where whole constituencies had been rigged. It was also noted that several constituencies which were known as left wing strongholds had produced massive victory margins in favour of Congress (I) whereas the CPI-M increased its vote share in constituencies which were Congress strongholds; the explanation provided by the CPI-M was that violence and rigging methods were mostly employed at unfavorable constituencies and that elections had been rigged in 87–172 other constituencies. One of the discrepancies pointed at by the CPI-M was that the constituency of Baranagar which had recorded a very high voter turnout despite being subject to section 144 and violent clashes throughout the day which had resulted in the death of one its workers. Basu refused to accept the results and declared that the new assembly was an "assembly of frauds". He also published an open editorial to the "world press" regarding terming the incidents of violence to be "semi fascist terror". The CPI-M boycotted the assembly for the remaining term of the seventh assembly taking the stance that a "massive rigging" had occurred. In 1975, the Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi imposed a national emergency on the premise of internal disturbances suspending elections, legitimising rule by decree and curbing civil liberties. The proposition for the declaration of the emergency and the formal draft of the ordinance were both notably corroborated to have been forwarded by Siddhartha Shankar Ray. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) emerged as one of the primary opposition to the emergency rule of Indira Gandhi. The following period witnessed a succession of authoritarian measures and political repression, which was particularly severe in West Bengal. The members of the CPI-M's labour union became the first subject to political repression and mass arrests while the rest of the members of the CPI-M went underground. With the initiation of the Jayaprakash Narayan (JP)'s movement, the CPI-M began providing support to it and went on to participate in discussions for the creation of