West Bengal Trinamool Congress Hoogly candidate Rachana Banerjee

Highlighting her star appeal, actor turned politician and Trinamool Congress candidate from Hooghly Lok Sabha constituency Rachana Banerjee began her campaign on Saturday by telling the voters that they can “see her in person now”.

“So long, you have been watching me on television, now you can see me in your midst. You can watch me on television in the evening and see me in person in the morning,” Ms. Banerjee said, trying to woo voters ahead of the Lok Sabha election.

For voters in West Bengal, who had elected a number of actors to the Lok Sabha and had to digest a heavy diet of cinema dialogues during the previous election campaign, Ms. Rachana Banerjee’s remarks are not new. Another actor turned politician and Birbhum MP Satabdi Roy, during her campaign in an earlier Lok Sabha election, had made similar remarks .“Earlier, you had to buy cinema tickets to see me. Now you can see me in your midst,” Ms. Roy had said during the campaign.

Ms. Rachana Banerjee is pitted against the BJP’s Locket Chatterjee, also an actor turned politician, who was elected from the Hooghly Lok Sabha seat in 2019. Interestingly, both actors have shared the screen in many popular Bengali films.

While the Trinamool Congress has not fielded actors Nushrat Jahan and Mimi Chakraborty, who won in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, Ms. Rachana Banerjee is a new addition to the list of party candidates with star appeal to woo voters.

The BJP has also fielded Kharagpur MLA and actor Hiranmoy Chatterjee to take on popular actor and sitting MP Deb alias Dipak Adhikari from the Ghatal Lok Sabha seat.