It is bad enough when a serving judge makes divisive comments on religious communities publicly, it is far worse when he refuses to apologise. Shekhar Kumar Yadav, a judge of the Allahabad High Court, had been called before the Supreme Court collegium to account for his remarks at an event organised by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. There Mr Yadav used a derogatory term to refer to members of India’s largest minority community, and said, for example, that India would be run by the majority. He spoke of the uniform civil code as a kind of corrective to certain practices of the minority community. The general trend of the speech was divisive and, according to lawmen and others, it violated the constitutional principle of secularism. By doing so, it went against the oath of office of a judge in a constitutional court by being contrary to the impartiality that was the requirement of his profession. When asked for his response to the meeting with the collegium by the chief justice of the Allahabad High Court, Mr Yadav said he did not apologise for his speech since he was speaking of societal problems which did not hurt constitutional principles or a judge’s position.

There is something shocking in a judge’s public expression of bias and his decision to stick by his views. Judges can have personal preferences and opinions, but these should not cross the boundaries of the private. The occasion of Mr Yadav’s speech suggests that he wished to make his prejudices known. By placing them in public discourse, he was passing judgment on a religious community without basis — he would not be unaware of the weight a judge’s words carry. His insistence that he violated neither the Constitution nor his professional oath is puzzling: such fundamental misunderstandings can suit a non-judicial person, not a judge. Thirteen senior advocates have asked the Supreme Court to direct the Central Bureau of Investigation to register a first information report against Mr Yadav for his “stark and inflammatory” divisive speech. There could be charges under sections of the Bharata Nyaya Sanhita against wounding a community and inciting hatred for it. But the central question is about the viability of a selection process that allows judges unapologetic about publicly expressed prejudices to sit in a high court.