With only two phases of the seven-phase Lok Sabha elections remaining, the Election Commission has now upped the ante against political parties particularly the BJP and the Congress asking them to desist from campaigning along caste, community, language, and religious lines, asserting that India' socio-cultural milieu cannot be made a casualty to elections.

The two phases will see polls on 115 seats including in Delhi on Saturday. The Election Commission on Wednesday in a stern warning to both the BJP and the Congress, the EC has also directed them to issue a formal notice to its "star campaigners" disallowing them from making statements that "divide the society" and may cause tension between different castes and communities.

The EC  had last month issued notices to JP Nadda on Opposition charges that Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave a divisive speech in Rajasthan's Banswara. A similar notice had been issued to Mallikarjun Kharge, too, based on the complaints filed by the BJP against him and the main Opposition party's senior leader Rahul Gandhi regarding their remarks. The commission rejected the defence by Nadda and Kharge and asked them to instruct their parties' star campaigners to desist from campaigning along caste, community, language, and religious lines.

The EC also asked the Congress not to politicise defence forces and make potentially divisive statements regarding socio-economic composition of the armed forces.

The EC had broken from norms when it issued notices to the BJP and Congress presidents on April 25 on complaints against Modi by the Opposition and against Rahul and Kharge by the ruling party. While the EC did not name Modi or Rahul, it asked Nadda and Kharge for their "comments" on the "star campaigners" alleged MCC violations.

"Elections are periodic exercises, they come and go, but political parties like yours endure; even more enduring preserve is India's socio-cultural milieu; political parties are in the task of nurturing leaders for the country for present and future," the commission said.

It also asked the Congress to ensure that its star campaigners and candidates do not make statements which give false impression that the Constitution may be abolished or sold. The EC asked the presidents of the two national parties to issue formal notes to their star campaigners to correct their discourse, exercise care and maintain decorum.

Referring to their respective replies to the notices issued to them on April 25, the election authority said "technical loopholes or extreme interpretations of other political party's utterances" cannot discharge the parties and their campaigners from the core responsibility of their own content which ought to be corrective to the ongoing discourse "and not further plummeting the quality of campaign discourse".

It reminded the two parties of provisions of the model code which state that no party or candidate will include in any activity which may aggravate existing differences or create mutual hatred or cause tension between different castes and communities, religious or linguistic.

In his reply to the notice, Nadda had maintained that the statements of BJP's star campaigners rely on facts to expose the "mal intent" of the Congress to the nation. He had also told the EC that the Congress and the INDIA Bloc, in pursuance of vote-bank politics, have begun opposing India as a nation, its identity, its original Hindu religion.

The poll body rejected Nadda's defence describing it as "not-tenable" and asked him and his party's star campaigners to desist from campaigning on religious and communal lines. It also asked the BJP to stop campaign speeches that may divide society. "The commission expects BJP, as the ruling party at the Centre, to fully align the campaign methods to the practical aspects of the composite and sensitive fabric of India."