West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi on Monday invited Buddhadeb Bhattacharya to form the new Council of Ministers after the chief minister tendered his resignation and formally staked claim to form the new government in the state.

The governor accepted the resignation letter and requested Bhattacharya to continue till alternative arrangents are made.

Bhattacharya met the governor at Raj Bhavan for about 30 minutes.

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The seventh Left Front government will formally take charge on May 18 with the swearing-in of the members of the new Bhattacharya ministry.

A Raj Bhavan release said that the governor, in response to Left Front chairman Biman Bose's letter confirming the election of Bhattacharya as Left Front legislature party leader and having pursued the Election Commission's notification dated May 13, invited Bhattacharjee to become chief minister and to form the new Council of Ministers.

Bhattacharya, it said, conveyed to the governor that he would submit the names of his new Council of Ministers on May 17.

Following this, the governor will issue a notification appointing the Council of Ministers to be sworn in on May 18.

"As per formality, I tendered my resignation to the governor who also handed me a letter asking me to continue till the swearing-in of my new government," Bhattacharya told reporters after the meeting.

Bhattacharya said he had handed over to the governor a letter of the Left Front chairman Biman Bose staking claim to form the new Left Front government.

Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led Left Front, which stormed back to power in West Bengal for the seventh consecutive term in the just concluded assembly elections, will take over charge on May 18.

Earlier during the day, the senior-most member in the newly-constituted 14th West Bengal Assembly, Gyan Singh Sohanpal, was apppointed pro tem speaker by the state government.

Sohanpal will administer oath to the newly-elected members of the assembly on Tuesday, Assembly Secretariat sources said.

The veteran Congress leader Sohanpal, re-elected from Kharagpur (town) constituency, will take oath before the governor at the Raj Bhavan on Tuesday.