Agartala, April 7 (IANS): Veteran Congress leader and former Tripura Chief Minister Samir Ranjan Barman was expelled from the party, it announced here on Friday.

"The All India Congress Committee (AICC) has expelled Samir Ranjan Barman from the party for six years for anti-party activities," Tripura Pradesh Congress President Birajit Sinha told the media.

Barman, who was the state Congress chief for three years and Chief Minister for a year (1992-93), attended some public meetings of Trinamool Congress last year. 

At a public meeting, he shared the dias with Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Barnerjee.

Barman, a lawyer, was elected to the Tripura state assembly five times.

Sinha said the AICC had earlier served show cause notice to Barman but he did not respond.

In his over a five-decade-old political career, this is the fourth time that the 79-year-old leader has been expelled from the party.

The former leader's son Sudip Roy Barman along with five other Congress legislators quit the party last year to protest the Congress' electoral alliance with the Left parties before the West Bengal assembly polls.

The Congress has called a 24-hour shut-down in Tripura on May 18 to protest the alleged misrule of the Left Front government in the state.

"Many illegal chit fund organisations taken away huge amounts of money from lakhs of people in Tripura, but the government did not take effective steps to bring back the hard-earned money of the depositors," said Sinha, who is also a Congress legislator.

The opposition party demanded monthly allowance to the unemployed youths in the state.