Agartala, Jan 12 (IANS): Throwing protocol to the winds for the second time, Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar Thursday refused to wear the regulation gown at the Tripura University convocation.

"The chief minister refused to put on the convocation gown. We can't force him to wear it," a university official told reporters.

Sarkar, along with Vice President Hamid Ansari, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Tripura Governor D.Y. Patil, Union Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal, university chancellor Amiya Kumar Bagchi, vice chancellor Arunoday Saha, and other dignitaries took part in the ceremonial academic procession before the 9th convocation of the Tripura central university.

While Sarkar sported a kurta-pajama all the others wore the convocation gown.

Sarkar, 63, who has been the chief minister of Tripura since 1998, refused to comment on the issue.

In September 2010 also, the Communist Party of India-Marxist politburo member turned down the university's request to wear the regulation robe during its 8th convocation.

In April 2010, union minister Jairam Ramesh, while attending the convocation of the Indian Institute of Forest Management in Bhopal had also refused to wear the convocation gown.

"I still have not been able to figure out after more than six decades of India's independence that why we stick to these barbaric colonial relics," Ramesh had said.