India’s apex body of the Catholic clergy, the Catholic Bishops Conference of India, on Wednesday urged MPs to impeach Justice Shekhar Kumar Yadav of Allahabad High Court who purportedly made majoritarian remarks at a VHP event on Sunday.

The Supreme Court had on Tuesday sought a report from the high court on Justice Yadav’s speech, where he allegedly referred to Muslims as “kathmullahs”, said India would run according to the majority’s wishes, and “pledged” that a uniform civil code would become reality.

“A few months back the Supreme Court had expunged observations made against Christians in a judgment of this very High Court in a case relating to allegations of wrongful exercise of religious freedom,” the CBCI said in a statement.

“Earlier, adverse remarks were made by the Supreme Court on the judgment that triggered violence in Manipur, where peace is still far away. The same was later deleted by Manipur High Court on appeal. A few years back in the case relating to Graham Staines murder the Supreme Court itself made such an error that was recalled by the very same bench that pronounced it.”

The statement added: “One who does not have faith in our Constitution and its morality should have nothing to do with the Judiciary in India, much less to be a judge….”

It said the “authority to initiate action in such cases” is vested in Parliament under Articles 124 and 217 of the Constitution.

“If the government of the day fails, it is the primary duty of the Opposition to step in,” the CBCI added.

“Sadly, we find all political parties have failed in this grave situation. However, the glimmer of hope is that as per the reports some of the brave Members of Parliament and smaller parties have already raised demands for initiation of removal proceedings,” the statement said.

It added: “Simultaneously, we also hear calls to leave this issue to the internal disciplinary committee of the Supreme Court. Let us not repeat the mistakes.

“In the past steps taken by the Supreme Court committee in cases of misconduct by the Judges not only were unsatisfactory, but also saw the persons against whom such committees were set up getting elevated to constitutional positions including the Membership of the Parliament.

“The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India (CBCI), under these circumstances, hereby call upon all the individual Members of Parliament, disregarding political affiliations, to rise to the occasion and take steps to actively support the Constitutional action against the concerned judge so that such incidents are not repeated by anyone.”