Modi to address Tripura Cabinet today

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be addressing Cabinet ministers of the country's only Left-ruled state, Tripura, on Monday. It is the first occasion when he'd be doing so in any state while PM.

Barring a five-year period ending in 1993, Tripura has been ruled by the CPI(M)-led Left Front since 1978. Its chief minister, Manik Sarkar, has been in that office since 1998.

A senior minister in the state government confirmed Modi would be meeting them on Monday, after inauguration of the second unit of the Palatana power plant near Agartala, the state capital.

Rising above political affiliations, Sarkar invited Modi to address the Cabinet, said a person in the know. Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been vigorously opposed by the CPI(M).

Sarkar has been a severe critic of the Modi government. He had in September come down heavily on the centre saying it was a "regime for the rich, industrial giants and the private sector and not for the poor." He even accused the NDA government of pushing its "pro-rich, capitalist and Hindutva policies." The BJP government is trying to turn secular India into a Hindu nation by pushing the Sangh Parivar's Hindutva agenda, Manik Sarkar had said.

A BJP senior said the party had been trying to make inroads into the state for some time, noting it got a 23 per cent vote share in the recent panchayat polls.

The meeting is expected to be in the afternoon, after Modi commissions the second unit of the Palatana plant, of the ONGC Tripura Power Company. Oil and Natural Gas Corporation has 50 per cent of the equity in the joint venture company. The rest is with ILFS, the Tripura government and other investors.

Modi has been on a spree of meetings and inaugurations in the northeast region since leading the BJP to power at the Centre in mid-year.