In the early 1990s, Samajwadi Party founder and the then chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav was given the moniker ‘Mullah Mulayam’ over his decision to order police firing on kar sevaks in Ayodhya at the peak of the Ram Janmabhoomi temple. In the years that followed Mulayam unabashedly went on to don the chequered scarf and dupalli topi at Iftar parties that he organised at party headquarters and his official residence as UP CM to consolidate his then newly formed party among Muslims.