Lawyers’ union demands action against Allahabad HC judge for anti-Muslim hate speech at VHP event

The All India Lawyers Union on Monday wrote to the president and the chief justice of India seeking action against the Allahabad High Court’s Justice Shekhar Kumar Yadav for propagating anti-Muslim hate speech at a Vishwa Hindu Parishad event a day prior, reported The Hindu.

The union said that Yadav’s remarks “amounted to hate speech against the Muslim minority”.

Delivering an address on the “Constitutional Necessity of Uniform Civil Code”, Yadav said on Sunday that India would be run as per the wishes of its Hindu majority.

He also uttered a slur used for Muslims who have been circumcised and described the community as “harmful to the country”.

“They are the kind of people who do not want the country to progress and we need to be cautious of them,” said Yadav, a sitting High Court judge. He added that India would soon adopt a Uniform Civil Code – a common set of laws governing marriage, divorce, succession and adoption for all citizens.

Currently, such personal affairs of different religious and tribal groups – except in Uttarakhand and Goa – are based on community-specific laws largely derived from religious scripture.

The letter from the lawyers’ union said that Yadav’s speech was “against the Constitution, its ethos and a direct affront to its basic structure - secularism and independence of judiciary”, reported The Hindu.

“It tantamounts to sabotaging of independence of the judiciary from within,” the letter read.

“His imputations, allegations and expressions against the Muslim minority are of vicious, vitriolic and venomous nature; most unbecoming of a sitting judge of a constitutional court – violation of constitutional oath of office of a judge of the HC,” the union said, claiming that Yadav's concept of democracy was based on the doctrine of Hindutva.

The group urged President Droupadi Murmu and Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna to intervene and initiate proceedings against the judge.

The letter, signed by All India Lawyers Union President and Rajya Sabha MP Bikas Ranjan Bhattacharya and General Secretary PV Surendranath, said that Yadav’s speech illustrates the weaknesses of the Collegium system in selecting and appointing judges to constitutional courts, including High Courts and the Supreme Court.

The letter said the system had failed to address judicial misdemeanours or protect judicial independence. It called for an independent constitutional mechanism for selecting and appointing judges, ensuring no dominance by the executive or judiciary.

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi also criticised Yadav’s remarks, saying it was unfortunate that a High Court judge attended the conference organised by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, an organisation that has been banned on several occasions.

“This speech can be easily rebutted, but it’s more important to remind his honour that the Constitution of India expects judicial independence and impartiality,” Owaisi wrote on X. “May I direct his attention to 'AoR Association vs Union of India: ‘Impartiality, independence, fairness and reasonableness in decision-making are the hallmarks of the judiciary.’”

The MP from Hyderabad said that the Constitution is democratic, not majoritarian, and protects minority rights, and asked if minority groups could expect justice from someone like Yadav.

Violation of constitution oath: Brinda Karat writes to CJI

Brinda Karat, former MP and Communist Party of India (Marxist) Polit Bureau member, wrote to the chief justice, saying that Yadav’s speech violated his constitutional oath and sought that action be taken against him, reported The Hindu.

“This speech is a hate speech,” Karat wrote in the letter. “This speech is an assault on the Constitution. This speech is an affront to the collective conscience of a secular and democratic country. That it should have been made by a justice of the Allahabad High Court is also an assault on the processes of justice.”

“No litigant can expect justice in a court where a judge holds biased, prejudiced views against minorities and supports a majoritarian approach,” she added.

Karat said that judges like Yadav discredit the judicial system and that there should be no place for them in a court of justice.

Judicial ethical conduct disregarded: Ashish Goel

Supreme Court lawyer Ashish Goel wrote to the chief justice of the Allahabad High Court, saying that the “mere fact” that Justice Yadav chose to participate in a Hindutva organisation’s event “disregards judicial ethical conduct and has a tendency to compromise the judiciary’s reputation for impartiality”.

Goel further said the comments have “caused great damage to the democratic fabric of the nation”. He urged the chief justice of the High Court to take steps so as to “preserve people’s faith and trust in the independence and impartiality of the judiciary”.

Demand for in-house inquiry

On Tuesday, the Campaign For Judicial Accountability and Reforms sought an in-house inquiry against Yadav and demanded that be removed from his judicial duties.

In a letter to Khanna, the group’s convenor advocate Prashant Bhushan said that Yadav’s “veiled and direct attacks against India’s Muslims amounts to gross judicial impropriety”.

It said that Yadav’s use of a slur against Muslims brought disrepute to the office of the judge and undermined the rule of law.

The letter said Yadav’s participation in the event and his statements violated Articles 14 (right to equality), 21 (right to life and personal liberty), 25 (right to religion) and 26 (the right of religious denominations to manage their religious affairs) of the Constitution.

The letter said that “communally charged statements by a sitting judge not only “hurt religious sentiment” but also “completely erode faith of the general public in the integrity and impartiality of the judicial institution”.

The speech is “a brazen violation of his oath as a judge where he had promised to uphold the constitution and its values impartially”.