BHUBANESWAR: IN yet another populist measure to woo the voters, the State Government on Thursday announced that landless Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Caste families residing in scheduled and Modified Area Development Approach (MADA) pockets will be given rights over the harvest in cashew plantations of two acres. A decision to this effect was taken at a high-level meeting presided over by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik at the Secretariat here. Cashew plantations raised under various poverty alleviation programmes and river basins for conservation of wasteland will be included in this scheme. However, cashew plantations raised inside reserve forest and from own funds of Cashew Development Corporation will be out of this scheme. The Cashew Development Corporation has, however, been asked to assist the beneficiaries for maintenance of the plantations and planting new saplings. These cashew plantations will be nurtured with the help of National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), National Horticulture Mission and other poverty alleviation programmes. Sources said that the scheme will help the landless tribals and SC families to increase their income. Though the financial implications of the new scheme are yet to be calculated, sources said it will be about a few crores. Opposition parties have criticised the decision and described this as another ploy by the Naveen Patnaik Government to hoodwink the tribal and SC voters. The Chief Minister has announced several other schemes, including rice at Rs 2 a kg, providing cycles to all the tribal girl students, the Biju Grameen Jyoti Yojana, the Biju KBK Yojana and Gopabandhu Grameen Yojana during the last one year. The financial implications of these programmes will be over Rs 2,500 crore. Sources in the Finance Department claimed that there will be no problem in the implementation of these programmes from the resources of the State Government as its tax and non-tax resources have increased during last two years.