The Supreme Court of India criticized current Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu in an order on Monday for making public statements about a case pending before the court. The CM claimed that animal fat instead of ghee (clarified butter) was used in laddoos (an Indian sweet) offered at the Tirumala Tirupati Hindu temple.

The temple is situated in a town that follows strict vegetarianism for religious purposes, and the supposed adulteration of the ghee with animal fat would undermine important religious customs. As the court put it in its order, the case has the potential to “affect the sentiments of [millions] of people living in the entire world.”

Allegations of the adulteration have cropped up multiple times on the Telegu Desam Party’s (TDP) official X (formerly Twitter) account, all of which have included scathing remarks leveled against Naidu’s predecessor, YS Jagan, who was the Chief Minister at the time the adulteration is alleged to have happened.

The bench, comprised of Justices B.R. Gavai and K.V. Vishwanathan, orally remarked that they “expect the Gods to be kept away from politics.”

The order noted that Naidu had gone public with the allegations on September 18, but that since then some reports also showed that the executive officer of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam Trust, which manages the temple, denied their veracity. The state had constituted a special investigation team to look into the matter, but it has since disbanded as the matter has been taken up the Supreme Court.

The court observed in its order that:

We are, prima facie, of the view that it was not appropriate on the part of a high constitutional functionary to go in public to make a statement which can affect the sentiment of crores of people and when investigation to find out adulterated ghee was used to make laddus was underway.

The court stressed the need to maintain an independent investigation until the end of the case.