Thiruvananthapuram, May 18 (IANS) Kerala will get its first tribal minister, a woman, if Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, who is leaving for New Delhi Thursday, gets the high command's approval, party sources said.

 
 P.K. Jayalekhsmi, 29, the Congress legislator from Mananthavady in Waynad district, is the only woman in the 38-member Congress legislature party list that the chief minister and state party president Ramesh Chennithala are carrying with them, a top Congress source told IANS Wednesday.
 
 Chandy, along with leaders of the six allies of the United Democratic Front (UDF), was sworn in here Wednesday by Governor R.S. Gavai.
 
 Jayalekshmi, from the Kurichiya tribe, is a graduate with a diploma in computers and is believed to have been handpicked by Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi during his candidate-scouting exercise prior to the just-concluded assembly elections.
 
 Mananthavady is a constituency reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidates. 
 
 "I am very happy to be here," an unassuming Jayalekshmi told reporters after Chandy's swearing-in ceremony.
 
 The other ministerial hopefuls are Aryadan Mohammed, Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan, V.D. Satishan, K. Babu, K. Muraleedharan, V.S. Sivakumar, Adoor Prakash, A.P. Anil Kumar, C.N. Balakrishnan, T.N. Prathapan, K.C. Joseph and Sakthan Nadar, the sources said.
 
 The sewaring-in of the next batch of ministers is expected to be held May 23.