"""
Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, outlawed bridge, popular with the intelligentsia, and shut down clubs where the card game was played. “They were worried that when too many intelligent people got together, it could easily develop into something else,” mathematician Mircea Mihu said.
"""
But it was replaced by a chess club. I assume that similarly intelligent people play chess.
Chess is a 2-player affair only, and not conducive to conversation.
Both of those claims are incorrect.
My guess, authoritarian communist regimes do not take kindly to any private gathering spots for the general public. People were expected to go to work, go home, keep their mouths closed.