1971 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election

Legislative Assembly elections were held in the Indian state of West Bengal in 1971. The assembly election was held alongside the 1971 Indian general election.

Parties and coalitions
Ahead of the 1971 election the map of party coalitions was redrawn. The United Front had split into two after the resignation of its Chief Minister, Bangla Congress leader Ajoy Mukherjee. Mukherjee was attracted towards the policies of Indira Gandhi, who was also opposed to the old guard of the state Congress unit like Atulya Ghosh, Bijoy Singh Nahar & Prafulla Chandra Sen like him, which caused him to fall out with his deputy chief minister, CPI(M) leader Jyoti Basu. The United Left Front, also known as the Six-Party Coalition, was led by the CPI(M) and included RSP, RCPI-Sudhindranath Kumar group, Biplobi Bangla Congress (a breakaway faction of the Bangla Congress opposed to Ajoy Mukherjee's rapprochement with Indira Gandhi), BPI-Nepal Bhattacharya group, WPI and the MFB.

The United Left Democratic Front, also known as the Eight-Party Coalition, was led by the CPI and included AIFB, SUCI(C), the All India Gorkha League, BPI-Barada Mukutmoni group, RCPI-Anadi Das group, the SSP rebels & PSP. The ULDF failed to reach a seat-sharing agreement with the Bangla Congress, but managed to agree to some seat-sharings with the Congress(R).

The Bangla Congress courted the Congress(R) for a seat-sharing alliance, but the Congress(R) rejected the offer. For Congress(R) the Bangla Congress was considered too close to Congress(O).

Violence
The electoral campaign was marred by violent incidents. The Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) called for electoral boycott. The CPI(M) on the other hand saw the CPI(ML) as a pawn of Congress(R) to sabotage its chances of winning power in the state. Across the state CPI(M) and CPI(ML) confronted each other; CPI(M) claimed that the CPI(ML) had killed some 200 of its cadres.

Three candidates were killed during the electoral campaign; on February 17, 1971 Debdatta Mondal (Bangla Congress candidate in Ukhra) was killed, on February 20, 1971 the All India Forward Bloc leader and Shyampukur constituency candidate Hemanta Kumar Basu was killed in broad daylight and on March 5, 1971 Pijush Chandra Ghosh (Congress(O) candidate in Dum Dum) was killed. Elections were countermanded in these three constituencies, but in Shyampukur no election was held as Ajit Kumar Biswas (the candidate nominated by the Forward Bloc in lieu of Hemanta Kumar Basu) was killed as well.

Outcome
Following the election, the Congress(R), the Bangla Congress and the ULDF came to an agreement (albeit without the approval of SUCI), that Congress(R) and Bangla Congress would form a government and ULDF would support it from outside. Two ULDF affiliates, SSP and Gorkha League, joined the government.