Lucknow, June 14 -- Despite a perception that Muslim voters have historically been indifferent to the Bharatiya Janata Party's politics, the ruling party is reaching out to Pasmanda Muslims ahead of the 2027 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections. The party feels this segment of the community has directly benefited from welfare schemes like One District One Product (ODOP) and a flat electricity rate for power looms. The focused outreach to Pasmanda Muslims in key pockets of Uttar Pradesh signals a strategic attempt to reshape minority voting patterns through welfare outreach and direct engagement, setting the stage for a keenly contested electoral battle in the country's most populous state. Through its Minority Morcha and other frontal organisations, the BJP is running membership drives, and direct engagement initiatives, particularly in the power-loom-dominated regions of Purvanchal. A sizeable chunk of the Pasmanda Muslims belong to eastern Uttar Pradesh. The move also appears aimed at weakening the Samajwadi Party's grip on the minority segment of its PDA (Pichhda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak) plank, which gained momentum during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Danish Azad Ansari, minister of state for minority welfare, Waqf and Haj, who hails from the Pasmanda community, has been touring weaver clusters across eastern Uttar Pradesh, listening to concerns and promising policy support. He has assured weavers that the government will maintain the flat electricity rate for power looms introduced in 2023 and is considering further reductions in slabs to provide additional relief. "Our double-engine government is committed to the genuine development of Pasmanda Muslims, who were ignored by previous regimes," Ansari said. "We accepted their long-standing demand for flat-rate electricity and are now working to bring the rates down even further," he added. The UP BJP Minority Morcha is leading a vigorous membership drive, with leaders claiming that over 500,000 Muslims have already joined the party, and the numbers continue to grow daily. Ansari criticised the Congress and Samajwadi Party for treating Muslims merely as a vote bank. "Earlier governments misguided the community for electoral gains. The youth of the minority community now understand that symbolic representation offered by parties like the SP and BSP did little for their actual uplift," he said, citing examples such as senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan and Naseemuddin Siddiqui, whose political journey has taken him from the Bahujan Samaj Party to the Congress and the Samajwadi Party. On the issue of political representation, Ansari noted that ticket distribution remains the prerogative of the party's top leadership. While the BJP has not fielded Muslim candidates in recent assembly elections, sources indicate it may consider some winnable seats in 2027. Ansari himself expressed readiness to contest if asked, stating he is confident of victory. During the 2023 urban local body polls, the BJP fielded a significant number of Muslim candidates, giving around 270 corporator tickets and 32 chairman tickets for Nagar Palika and Nagar Panchayat posts. Of these, 12 chairman candidates and 73 corporators won, mainly from Amroha, Sambhal, Bareilly, Hardoi, Kushinagar, Ballia, and Unnao. Addressing Opposition allegations regarding bulldozer actions and encounters, Ansari said such operations target criminals alone and are not directed at any particular community. "Linking law enforcement with religious identity is an attempt to shield criminals and polarise society," he added....