The Election Commission on Tuesday issued an advisory to political parties and their star campaigners, asking them to exercise caution and restraint in their utterances during campaigning in Karnataka and not to vitiate the election atmosphere.

Taking serious note of the "plummeting level of campaign discourse" during electioneering, the poll panel referred to the instances of "inappropriate vocabulary and language" used during the ongoing campaign by persons, "in particular, by those invested with the statutory status of star campaigner".