THE EIFFEL TOWER closed today because of a strike by staff over the removal of female colleagues during a visit by a Hindu religious group, workers and management said.<\/p>\n
The visit came on the same day as a cultural boat procession on the Seine organised by the Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) spiritual movement.<\/p>\n
In a statement, Eiffel Tower staff condemned \u201cprofessional instructions that led to female employees being sidelined, replaced and made invisible because of their sex\u201d during the visit by the delegation.<\/p>\n
\u201cInstructions 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,\u201d the staff said in their statement, adding they were shocked to have been put in such a situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome were asked to leave their posts and withdraw to other areas. In some posts they were replaced by men. And all female employees were instructed not to go through or cross certain areas while the delegation was present.\u201d<\/p>\n
The operating company that runs the Paris landmark, SETE, acknowledged that the Hindu delegation had requested the visit be organised so as to limit \u201cinteractions with women\u201d and said that \u201cthese conditions should not have been accepted\u201d.<\/p>\n
The conditions \u201cwere not in line with SETE\u2019s values, nor with the principles of equality between men and women,\u201d the company said, promising to accept the \u201cconsequences\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is clearly not an acceptable practice,\u201d SETE president Ariel Weil, who is also a socialist elected official in Paris, told AFP.<\/p>\n
\u201cI restate the Eiffel Tower\u2019s commitment to republican values and to the equality of men and women.\u201d<\/p>\n
The French capital\u2019s socialist mayor Emmanuel Gregoire said on X it was \u201cunacceptable\u201d that the Tower management agreed to the delegation\u2019s conditions, and said an investigation would be launched.\n<\/p>\n
Hindu nationalist ties<\/p>\n
The Tower, which receives nearly seven million visitors a year according to its website, was closed all day on Monday, but will open as normal on Tuesday according to a staff representative.<\/p>\n
BAPS, which is close to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s ruling conservative Hindu nationalist party, consecrated its first major temple in France on Sunday, near Paris.<\/p>\n
French equality minister Aurore Berge reacted angrily on X.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn France, we do not ask women to erase themselves. No dogma, no religion is above the laws of the Republic,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n
Far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen also criticised the incident, saying France would \u201cnever accept that women\u2019s presence be \u2018limited\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n
Gabriel Attal, a centrist rival to become president, said that \u201cin France, no culture, no belief, no religion, nothing and no one can come and dictate to women what their place should be\u201d.<\/p>\n