Agartala, Mar 1: The Left Front government headed by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar is set to assume office in Tripura for its fifth consecutive term March 6, officials said Friday.
The Left Front is led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).
"The Left Front leaders Friday at a meeting decided that the swearing-in ceremony of the seventh Left Front government led by Sarkar would be held on March 6 at Raj Bhavan here," CPI-M spokesman Gautam Das told IANS.
Sarkar has been heading the government in the northeastern state since 1998.
"Governor D.Y. Patil would administer the oath of office and secrecy to Sarkar and his council of ministers at a function at Raj Bhavan," an official at the governor's office told IANS.
Das said that a rally will be held here on March 7 to celebrate the electoral victory of the Left parties in the Feb 14 polls to the 60-member house.
India's second longest running Left government - after West Bengal - was returned to power for a fifth consecutive term and the seventh since 1978 in Tripura Thursday, when the votes cast were counted.
The Left Front increased the number of seats and its vote share over 2008, winning 50 seats (one more than in 2008) and routing the main opposition Congress, which secured only 10 seats.
However, the CPI-M was the main gainer, as the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and Forward Bloc lost respectively the two and one seat they contested. The RSP had two seats in the outgoing assembly.
While the Congress managed to retain its 2008 tally of 10 seats, its ally, the Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (INPT) drew a blank. It had won one seat five years ago.
Five women, the highest number so far, were elected to the 11th Tripura assembly - all from the CPI-M. The 60-member house will see nine new faces, of which eight are from the CPI-M.
Of the 20 seats reserved for tribals, 19 were bagged by the Left Front while one went to the Congress and the Left party won nine of the ten seats reserved for the Scheduled Castes. One SC reserved seat was bagged by the Congress.
