Three former former chief ministers of Jharkhand, Babulal Marandi, Arjun Munda and Raghubar Das, were among the 40 star campaigners named on Wednesday by the BJP ahead of the first phase of Assembly elections in Bengal on March 27.

While Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the biggest star campaigner of the party, had kicked off the saffron camp’s high-pitched electioneering with his rally at Calcutta's iconic Brigade Parade Ground on March 7, the party will leave no stone unturned to launch a battery of other leaders in its endeavour to unseat the Mamata Banerjee- led Trinamool Congress from power.

For Jharkhand BJP, the three former CMs are their biggest faces with rich political acumen for canvassing, said officials in the state unit. Of the three, Munda is currently a minister in the Modi cabinet while Das, after losing power in the state in 2019, is now a national vice president of the party. On the other hand, Marandi, who returned to the BJP fold in February 2020, is the state unit’s legislative party leader.

A senior BJP leader in Ranchi said all three will have a key role to play in Bengal polls. “Large parts of Jharkhand are connected with Bengal by virtue of it being our immediate neighbour. People living on the border areas also have identical lifestyles, culture and customs. In that respect, they will have an important role to play to connect with voters,” he said.

“The areas of Junglemahal that are going to polls in the first two phases have many tribal dominated pockets where Jharkhand’s two biggest tribal faces—Munda and Marandi _ will come in handy. Das on the other hand will focus on OBC voters,” added another state leader.

BJP spokesperson Pratul Shahdeo maintained that all three ex-CMs had already undertaken several tours of Bengal for meetings and rallies in the recent weeks. “With polls nearing, they will intensify their campaigning and public connect programmes as tasked by the party high command,” he said.