Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik during the election campaign in Bhubaneswar on April 26. (Photo: AFP)

Bhubaneswar : Talk was that Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik was an elitist and that he could not speak Oriya, but the man was on May 13 set for a second term in office –– essentially because of his image as an anticorruption crusader.

Beating the anti-incumbency syndrome that saw his counterparts S.M. Krishna in Karnataka and N. Chandrababu Naidu in Andhra Pradesh bite the dust, Patnaik’s Biju Janata Dal (BJD) won a comfortable majority in the Assembly.

Of the 135 seats –– out of the total 147 –– declared results, BJD won 55 seats, its partner, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) 30, the Congress Party 36 and independents 14.

“He did not face the anti-incumbency syndrome because of his image as a anticorruption crusader over the past four years that he has been the state chief minister,” said political analyst Rabi Das. “He initiated actions against top bureaucrats and politicians. He did not even spare his own council of ministers.”

“If you want to solve the problem of a poor state like Orissa you have to check corruption first,” Patnaik said repeatedly at every public meeting he addressed during the election.

The return of corruption-tainted former chief minister J.B. Patnaik as state Congress Party chief also helped. He won his Assembly seat in Begunia by only 2,000 votes. J.B. Patnaik, who was chief minister for 14 years, was removed from the post after the brutal killing of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two minor sons. He was also allegedly embroiled in several other cases, including those of corruption.

The contrast between the two Patnaiks was sharp and did not escape the people. “It was a blessing for him (Naveen Patnaik),” said Debendra Prusty, editor of the local weekly Sanchar, of the Congress Party’s decision to bring back J.B.

Naveen Patnaik also raised issues of nepotism against J.B. Patnaik during the campaign. According to a senior Congress leader, the party did not perform well because J.B. Patnaik did not have enough time to launch an effective counter-campaign against the chief minister.

Naveen Patnaik, 58, is a bachelor who entered politics in 1997 after the death of his father, former state chief minister Biju Patnaik. He became chief minister in 2000 after forging an alliance with the BJP.