Agartala, March 4: Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar this morning was re-elected leader of the Left Front Legislature Party in a meeting of the newly elected Left Front legislators.

The meeting was held in the CPM state headquarters at Melarmath and Manik Sarkar’s name as Front’s legislature party leader and chief minister was a unanimous choice as expected.

After the meeting, CPM party secretary Bijan Dhar and Left Front convener and party MP Khagen Das met governor D.Y. Patil and formally staked claim to form the 7th Left Front government. Having had a brief discussion with the governor, the CPM leaders returned.

Later around 4.30pm, Sarkar met the governor and discussed the details of the swearing-in ceremony scheduled on Wednesday at 3pm. Sarkar also submitted a list of 11 of his cabinet members who will be sworn in on Wednesday but neither Sarkar nor any of the CPM leaders gave any inkling of the names.

This time, nine new legislators had been elected to the Assembly from the Front. They are Ratan Das, Rajkumar Chowdhury, Ramendra Debbarma, Shyamal Chakra-borty, Ratan Bhowmik, Priyamoni Debbarma, Samiran Malakar, Tunurani Malakar and Lalit Debbarma.

The Opposition Congress’s lone newcomer is Pranjit Singharoy.

“Nothing can be disclosed about the composition of the cabinet but there won’t be many news faces. Vijaylaxmi Sinha may be considered for inclusion as the second woman minister as this time we have five elected women MLAs; the final decision will be taken by the chief minister and you will know on the day of swearing-in only,” said a source. He added that the swearing-in on Wednesday would be followed by the Left Front’s victory rally on Thursday. “We will be organising it in response to demands of our party and Front cadres but it will be a very restrained affair as students in the state are now taking board exams,” the source said.

The Assam PCC, meanwhile, has strongly condemned the unruly scenes and activities in front of Congress Bhawan in Agartala on Saturday when a section of irate party supporters had made an attempt to heckle Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi and AICC general secretaries Shakeel Ahmed and Luzinho Falerio.

Describing the incident as “highly reprehensible and shocking”, the PCC statement issued by general secretary Pradip Dutta Roy said the “unfortunate incident” clearly showed that the state leaders had failed to deal with the situation and perform their responsibilities.

“In Assam, the Congress faces conflicts and problems galore but the basic discipline of the party is scrupulously followed by workers and supporters,” said Dutta Roy, adding that the incident has “blackened the face of Tripura Congress in the entire Northeast”.

He said an “intensive inquest” should be conducted to ascertain why and how the Congress in Tripura had reached this stage in the run-up to and in the aftermath of the Assembly elections.

Tripura PCC president Sudip Roy Barman and leader of the Opposition Ratanlal Nath were not available for comment on the statement made by the Assam Pradesh Congress general secretary.