NEW DELHI: The Election Commission (EC) has warned the Uttarakhand BJP to be more careful in the future and advised it to follow all provisions of the poll code, days after it tweeted a morphed picture of Congress leader Harish Rawat.
Last week, the poll panel had issued a notice to the Uttarakhand unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for tweeting a morphed image of former chief minister Rawat, in which he was shown as a Muslim cleric.
An EC order issued on Wednesday said the Uttarakhand BJP has submitted that the purpose of the tweet was neither to violate any provisions of the Model Code of Conduct nor to create any differences between groups on the basis of religion, race, caste and language.
It has also told the poll panel that the tweet has since been deleted from its official Twitter handle. The EC said it has not found the reply of the Uttarakhand BJP satisfactory.
The order noted that an FIR has been lodged under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Representation of the People Act in connection with a Facebook post, which "will follow its logical conclusion".
"Now, therefore, the Commission warns the Bharatiya Janata Party, Uttarakhand to be more careful in future and advises to follow all the provisions of Model Code of Conduct and other guidelines of the Commission in letter and spirit," the order read.
The 70-member Uttarakhand Assembly is scheduled to go to polls on February 14 and the counting of votes will be taken up on March 10.