The Congress on Thursday claimed that public pressure forced the Election Commission's hand after the poll panel issued notice to BJP president J P Nadda on allegations that Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave a "divisive speech" in Rajasthan.

The EC is "super, super cautious" when it comes to the prime minister, Congress general secretary in-charge Jairam Ramesh said.

He pointed out that the EC has issued a notice to Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge on BJP's complaint against Rahul Gandhi's remarks and wondered whether this was what the poll body meant by "level playing field".

"The Election Commission has issued notices to the BJP President for campaign remarks made by the PM, on which the Congress had filed a complaint. At the same time, in virtually identical language, it has issued a notice to the Congress President on remarks made by Shri Rahul Gandhi, on which the BJP had complained," Ramesh said.

"Is this what the EC means by a 'level playing field'? It is clear that public pressure, motivated by the PM's outrageous remarks, have forced the EC's hand. But did it have to compensate by sending a notice on Rahul Gandhi's remarks as well?" he said.

By equating the two, the Commission has drawn attention to its own compulsions, Ramesh said.

By any standard, the equivalence is "bizarre" and "completely unwarranted and unjustified", he said.

"Meanwhile BJP candidates brazenly continue to use religious symbols in their election campaign," Ramesh said in a post on X.

Earlier, asked about the development at a press conference, Ramesh said, "We had complained to the Election Commission. We brought to their notice that the PM's language is against the Model Code of Conduct, the Representation of the People Act, 1951 and various verdicts of the Supreme Court." "There has been a delay, we have also complained about some other candidates misusing religion for votes. We believe that the EC will take action. We will reply to the notice we have got," he said.

Highlighting that the notice has been given to the BJP president, Ramesh asked one should also look into why has the notice been given.

"There had been no complaint against (former PMs) P V Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh. This is the second time we have complained against the PM. We had earlier complained about the home minister (Amit Shah) but no action was taken, action was taken against Assam chief minister," Ramesh said.

"We expect that the Election Commission impartially considers the complaints of various parties and wherever there is the need for a notice, they should give," he said.

Asked if the party feels that the notice should have been given to the prime minister, Ramesh said, "They are super, super cautious when it comes to the prime minister, they are super cautious when it comes to the home minister." In its letter addressed to BJP President J P Nadda, the EC asked him to respond by Monday to complaints filed by the Congress, CPI and CPI (ML) regarding the alleged "divisive and derogatory" remarks made by Modi on April 21 in Banswara.

It also asked Nadda to bring to the notice of all the star campaigners of the party to "set high standards of political discourse and observe provisions of model code of conduct in letter and spirit".

Officials said it is the first time that the panel has taken cognisance of a complaint against any prime minister.

The EC wrote a similarly-worded letter separately to the Congress president with regard to allegations levelled by the BJP against him and Gandhi.

The letters from the EC to the two-party presidents did not directly name either Modi, Gandhi or Kharge, but the representations received by it were attached to the respective letters and contained details of allegations against the three leaders.

Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Telegraph Online staff and has been published from a syndicated feed.