Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Sept 8: The world famous Eiffel Tower in Paris reopened on Tuesday after keeping closed on Monday due to a strike by the staff to protest over instructions given to female employees to “make themselves invisible” during the visit by around 100 monks associated with the Gujarat-based Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) to the monument on Saturday.
The Eiffel Tower’s operating company, Societe d’Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE) later acknowledged that the Hindu delegation had requested limited “interactions with women” and said that such “conditions should not have been accepted.”
The conditions “were not in line with SETE’s values, nor with the principles of equality between men and women,” the company said, promising to accept the “consequences.” “It is clearly not an acceptable practice,” SETE president Ariel Weil, who is also a socialist elected official in Paris, said. “I restate the Eiffel Tower’s commitment to republican values and to the equality of men and women.”
The BAPS delegation was in France for the opening of the new temple near Paris and had been visiting sites across the French capital. The BAPS ran into controversy following staff protest over allegations that women employees were asked to step away from their posts during the visit by the sect’s delegation on Saturday just before the inauguration of the BAPS’ first Swaminarayan Temple in France. Prime Minister Narendra Modi described the opening of BAPS’ first major temple in Paris on Sunday as a “new milestone in the cultural relations between India and France”, in a virtual address during the inauguration.
A grand Nagar Yatra, a three-hour-long cultural procession in central Paris with the Eiffel Tower in the backdrop, preceded the temple’s opening on Saturday. According to a statement from the organisation, nearly 6,000 participants from 42 countries attended the event.
But the visit to Eiffel Tower caused a controversy after the staff union at the Eiffel said the women felt “humiliated.” The BAPS apologised for “any pain or inconvenience caused” by the incident. “To the best of our knowledge, at no point was anyone prevented access to the Eiffel Tower,” the organisation wrote on X. “Due to the size of our delegation, the visit was arranged in conjunction with the Eiffel Tower team at the start of normal operating hours to avoid disrupting or inconveniencing others.”
Eiffel Tower staff said in a statement that it condemned “professional instructions that led to female employees being sidelined, replaced and made invisible because of their sex” during the visit by the delegation. “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 said in their statement, adding they were shocked to have been put in such a situation.
“Some 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.”
India’s Ministry of External Affairs has responded to the controversy surrounding reports that women employees at Paris’ Eiffel Tower were asked to move away from certain areas during a visit by a BAPS delegation. MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said the ministry was aware of the opening of a BAPS temple in the Paris area but described the issue at the tower as a matter between the organisations involved.
Speaking at a media briefing in New Delhi on Tuesday, Randhir Jaiswal said, “We are aware of the opening of a temple by the BAPS Sanstha in the Paris area. As to the particular issue pertaining to the Tower, this is a matter purely between the entities concerned.”
The BAPS Hindu temple in Paris also apologised, saying it understood the concerns raised and was taking them “very seriously”. The organisation said the visit had been coordinated with Eiffel Tower teams and arranged at the start of normal opening hours to minimise disruption to other visitors.
“To our knowledge, at no time was access to the Eiffel Tower denied to anyone,” BAPS said, while offering “our sincere apologies to anyone who may have been hurt or inconvenienced by this situation.” It also said it was “deeply committed to the universal values of mutual respect and service to others.”
The controversy prompted criticism from senior French political figures, with the reported restrictions on female staff drawing particular concern. The French capital’s socialist Mayor, Emmanuel Gregoire, said on X that it was “unacceptable” that the Tower management agreed to the delegation’s conditions, and said an investigation would be launched.
France’s National Assembly President Yaël Braun-Pivet also said she would not accept women being asked to step aside to meet the demands of foreign visitors.
French Minister for Gender Equality and the Fight Against Discrimination Aurore Berge reacted angrily on X. “In France, we do not ask women to erase themselves. No dogma, no religion is above the laws of the Republic,” she wrote. She called the incident “unacceptable,” saying equality between women and men was a non-negotiable principle in France.
Former prime minister Gabriel Attal also criticised the incident, saying that no culture, belief or worship should determine women’s place in public spaces. Far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen also criticised the incident, saying France would “never accept that women’s presence be ‘limited.’ “In France, no culture, no belief, no religion, nothing and no one can come and dictate to women what their place should be,” he said.
The Eiffel Tower receives nearly seven million visitors a year according to its website. BAPS, which is close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), consecrated its first major temple in France on Sunday near Paris.
The BAPS has built 1300 temples worldwide, including 14 major temples abroad. Of these the Akshardham temple complexes in Gandhinagar in Gujarat and Delhi are considered its major ones. Its latest major temple, the BAPS Hindu Mandir in Abu Dhabi, was inaugurated on February 14, 2024, by Mahant Swami Maharaj along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and UAE Minister Sheikh Nahayan Mabarak Al Nahyan.
Believed to have five million followers among Gujaratis alone, the sect has a huge following in East Africa, the United Kingdom and the US. In 2022, Prime Minister Modi inaugurated the month-long centenary celebrations of Pramukh Swami Maharaj, the fifth spiritual successor. The celebrations were so grand that an entire “city” was built on 600 acres of land on Ahmedabad’s outskirts, and world leaders and diplomats visited throughout the month.
The sect’s influence is also evident in the Paris temple, which involved collaboration with French architecture and engineering firms, including stone specialists H Chevalier, who worked on the restoration of the Notre-Dame Cathedral.
Built on the strength of volunteers, BAPS is known for its involvement in disaster relief, including the 2001 Kutch Earthquake. In September 2002, the Akshardham temple in Gandhinagar saw a terror attack that claimed the lives of 33 people.
The Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Sanstha (BAPS) was founded in 1907 by Shastri Maharaj, who broke away from the Vadtal diocese in 1905. It takes its name from Bochasan village in Anand district and is said to be the largest sect, known for the Akshardham series of temple complexes. The Vadtal diocese believes it is the parent body from which at least six splinter groups were formed, most of which believe in the supremacy of Sahajanand Swami, the founder of the sect. The 92-year-old Mahant Swami Maharaj is the sixth spiritual successor of Bhagwan Swaminarayan and the present guru of BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha. He was among those present during the consecration of the Paris temple.