Bhubaneswar, March 4: Zilla parishad and panchayat members can expect to get lucky as chief minister Naveen Patnaik completes 13 years in office tomorrow.

Broad hints with regard to enhancement of their power and perks is possible on the day which will be celebrated as Panchayat Raj Divas. Similar indications about raising the retirement age limit of state government employees may also be dropped pending a policy announcement since the Assembly is in session.

“The chief minister may make some announcement about increase in the power and perks of zilla parishad and panchayat members. This has been a long-standing demand,” said panchayati raj minister Kalpataru Das.

The state government has invited 854 zilla parishad members, 6,236 panchayat samiti members and 6,236 sarpanchs to the state-level function tomorrow.

Populist announcements appear to be the order of the day. The most of these being reducing the price of subsidised rice from Rs 2 to Re 1, which will render the exchequer poorer by around Rs 300 crore more. The government has also promised free cell phones and health insurance to farmers.

In a move aimed to broadbase the BJD’s vote bank, a special agriculture budget was tabled in the Assembly for the first time in the history of the state. The chief minister obviously seems to be targeting the poor, the youth and the farming community, apart from women, who have been his most loyal supporters.

Populism has been Naveen’s mantra in his latest avatar as the chief minister. Among the most eye-catching announcements of the government, have been free bicycles for girls and scheduled caste and scheduled tribe boys studying in Class X.

The provision of the Odisha Treatment Fund for BPL card-holders and one-time winter assistance of Rs 200 to the elderly, widows and the disabled to buy blankets are among his other attempts to draw in the votes at the time of polls.

Naveen has also matured politically over the years, making short work of enemies and taking allegations of scams and scandals in his stride. The latest friend-turned-rival that he has parted company with is his former chief aide, Pyari Mohan Mohapatra, who was dumped in the wake of an alleged coup attempt against the chief minister. Before him, he had similarly accounted for the likes, Bijay Mohapatra and Ramkrushna Patnaik, who were forced to quit the BJD.

Though a string of scams, including mining and coal, have hit the government in the past few years, he has managed to keep his ship steady banking solely on his personal image, which remains Teflon-coated. It was Naveen’s desperation to cling onto his clean and secular public image that made him dump the BJP, an ally of 10-year standing, in 2009 on the eve of the Assembly polls. The BJP, he felt, had gone soft on the perpetrators of the Kandhamal riots of 2008.

State Congress president Niranjan Patnaik, however, criticised Naveen, accusing him of trying to hoodwink people with populist announcements. “No development has actually taken place in the past 13 years. He only talks about it,” he said.