The Election Commission has moved to intensify scrutiny of campaign language after issuing a show-cause notice to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge over his description of Prime Minister Narendra Modi as a “terrorist”, marking one of the sharpest interventions yet in the conduct of the current Assembly election campaign. The notice, issued on 22 April, gave Kharge 24 hours to explain his stand and said the Commission was prima facie of the view that the remark amounted to a violation of the Model Code of Conduct in force for the elections in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal, Assam and Puducherry. The row gathered pace after a BJP delegation approached the poll body on Wednesday seeking strict action, arguing that the remark crossed the line of legitimate political criticism and lowered the level of public discourse. The delegation included Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju and Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal, alongside senior party office-bearers. Their complaint added to formal representations already before the Commission, which the notice says were received on 21 and 22 April. The Commission’s document states that Kharge, as Congress president and a star campaigner, had used “intemperate”, “highly objectionable” and “dehumanising” language against a constitutional functionary.
At the centre of the dispute is a press interaction in Chennai during the final stretch of campaigning in Tamil Nadu. The Commission’s notice records a transcript in which Kharge is stated to have asked how the AIADMK could align with Modi, “who is a terrorist and who is he who won’t believe in equality”. That phrasing has become the basis of the complaint and the EC’s action. Yet the matter did not end there. Kharge later said he had not used the term in a literal sense and argued that he meant the Prime Minister was “terrorising” democratic institutions, political parties and public life through the use of state power and political machinery. That clarification has become central to the Congress response and may shape how far the Commission chooses to proceed.
The episode has exposed how rapidly the threshold for acceptable speech is tightening in a campaign already marked by a hardening tone. The Model Code of Conduct does not bar political criticism, but it requires parties and candidates to confine attacks to policies, programmes, past record and work, while avoiding unverified allegations and personal abuse. The Commission also referred in its notice to an advisory issued on 1 March 2024 calling on parties, candidates and star campaigners to maintain restraint, decency and issue-based debate. By invoking that earlier advisory and Article 324 powers, the poll body signalled that it sees the dispute as more than a routine partisan complaint and as part of a broader pattern of rhetorical escalation.
For the BJP, the confrontation offers a chance to frame the Congress leadership as irresponsible on matters touching national security and political civility. Sitharaman said the complaint sought to underline that such language had been used by the president of the Congress in an election-bound state and described the wording as condemnable and outrageous. The party also tied the controversy to a wider charge that abusive language has become habitual in opposition attacks on Modi. Congress, for its part, has sought to portray the Commission’s intervention as selective and politically loaded, arguing that the poll body acts more swiftly when the ruling party’s complaints are involved than when the opposition raises its own concerns. That line of defence indicates this dispute may widen from one speech to a larger debate over institutional neutrality in an election year.
Another layer of controversy emerged around the wording and preparation of the EC notice itself. A version of the document carried what appeared to be internal inconsistencies, including a reference to a transcript from a future date, drawing criticism from Congress figures who accused the Commission of sloppiness and bias. Even so, the core legal and political issue remains unchanged: whether Kharge’s language can be treated as protected political speech sharpened by metaphor, or whether it crossed into prohibited dehumanising abuse under the code governing election campaigns. That distinction matters because the Commission’s next step could set a precedent for how aggressively it polices rhetoric in the remaining phases of state contests.