Eiffel Tower workers went on strike Monday after female staffers were told to step aside and be “invisible” during a weekend religious group visit — prompting outrage among the personnel at the explicit gender segregation.
On Saturday, a group of about 100 members of the Hindu denomination Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) made a private visit to the Eiffel Tower. The private visit reportedly occurred on the sidelines of a Hindu parade across the streets of the French capital to mark the consecration of BAPS’ first major temple in France.
While private visits to the Eiffel Tower are not unusual and can be arranged with its management, the tower’s workers denounced to local and international outlets that female employees were told to leave and be “invisible” to the visiting Hindu group.
The outraged staff workers responded by staging a strike on Monday, forcing the closure of the Eiffel Tower. Per the BBC, a sign read that the tower’s opening was delayed for “operational reasons.” According to local outlets, the tower was reopened on Tuesday morning following Monday’s strike.
In a statement shared with AFP, the tower’s staff condemned the “professional instructions that led to female employees being sidelined, replaced and made invisible because of their sex” during the religious group’s visit.
“Instructions were given to female employees of the Eiffel Tower and to female employees of contractors to make themselves invisible in order to welcome this delegation,” the staff reportedly said in their statement, adding they were shocked to have been put in such a situation.
The Eiffel Tower Exploitation Company (SETE), the group responsible for operating the monument, confirmed the gender staff restrictions in remarks shared with AFP. SETE stated that the restrictions were requested by the Hindu group to “limit interactions with women,” stressing these conditions should have not been accepted and are “not in line with SETE’s values.
Diane Davoine, an Eiffel Tower staff union representative, told Reuters women were asked to leave their workstations and be replaced by men as the Hindu group passed through.
“Tensions mounted over the weekend, so this morning, the employees decided to meet: first, to open a dialogue with management, and second, to ensure that women are never treated this way at the company again,” Davoine reportedly said, and added that the tower’s management has apologized to the staff over the incident.
Responding to the outrage, the Paris branch of the religious Hindu BAPS denomination released a statement apologizing. The group affirmed that the visit was organized with the Eiffel Tower at the start of opening hours to avoid disrupting others visitors.
“To the best of our knowledge, at no point was anyone prevented access to the Eiffel Tower,” the statement read in part. “Nevertheless, we sincerely apologize for any pain or inconvenience caused.”
Several French politicians across the political spectrum also expressed their outrage and condemnation of the events over the past hours.
In a social media post, socialist Mayor of Paris Emmanuel Grégoire said that he has taken note at the Eiffel Tower workers’ anger and deemed their discontent as legitimate. Grégoire announced that an investigation will be launched to determine the facts behind the incident.
“It is not acceptable that such conditions can be tolerated. These are neither my values, nor those that the Eiffel Tower should uphold, where everyone, regardless of gender, should be able to move about and act freely, without distinction between women and men,” Grégoire’s message read in part.
National Rally leader Marine Le Pen, for her part, wrote on a Monday social media post that, “In France, we will never accept that the presence of women be ‘limited.'”
“All light must be shed on what happened during this visit to the Eiffel Tower,” she said.
Similarly, the President of the French National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet wrote on social media that she refuses to allow women to be “compelled to step aside in order to meet the demands of foreign visitors.”
“Welcoming others never means renouncing our values. In France, women fully occupy public spaces. No one dictates to them that they must become invisible there,” she added.
Valérie Pécresse, President of the Regional Council of Île-de-France, said that she personally informed the representatives of the BAPS Hindu group in France that “such practices are contrary to the laws of the Republic.”
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