AGARTALA, Aug 28 (TIWN/IANS): Prominent communist leader and sitting CPI-M legislator Samir Deb Sarkar died here on Sunday after a protracted illness. He was 67.

Party sources said that Sarkar died at the government run Gobinda Ballav Panth Medical College and Hospital early Sunday. He was suffering from cancer.

He is survived by his four brothers and three sisters.

Sarkar, a bachelor, who was elected to the state assembly six times since 1983 from the Khowai assembly constituency, was the chief whip of the ruling Left Front in the state assembly.

"Details about the cremation of body of Sarkar and other party programme yet to decide," a Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader said.

A former Student leader, Sarkar became member of the CPI-M in 1976 and till death he was the member of the party's state committee.