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When religious customs meet French secularism · INSIGHT TODAY

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The Eiffel Tower has reopened a day after staff walked
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: out in protest at the removal of female employees to
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: accommodate a Hindu religious delegation. The operating company that runs
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: the Paris landmark later apologised and said it should not
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: have accepted the request by the group. The Hindu visitors
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: had asked to limit interactions with women as a condition
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: of their visit. Authorities in Paris have launched an investigation
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: into the incident.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: It was another busy morning at the Eiffel Tower on
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Tuesday with visitors making their way through security checkpoints at
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: the base. On average, the Paris landmark welcomes as many
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: as 20,000 visitors a day. But just a day earlier,
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: the scene was very different. The Eiffel Tower remained closed
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: because of a staff strike. Employees walked out to protest
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: instructions from management. telling female workers to stay out of
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  Speaker 2: sight during a visit by a Hindu religious delegation.
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: What's certain is that it will leave its mark in
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  Speaker 3: the minds of the employees of the Eiffel Tower because
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  Speaker 3: it remains an unprecedented event, extremely humiliating for women and
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: shocking for all the staff. So will society remember it?
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: That's another question altogether. But in any case, for us,
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  Speaker 3: it's something we definitely won't forget.
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  Speaker 2: The incident has prompted outrage in France, which prides itself
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: as a country committed to gender equality. The mayor of Paris,
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: Emmanuel Grégoire, said there would be an investigation. On Saturday,
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  Speaker 2: around 100 people linked to a Hindu group known as
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: BAPS made a private visit to the Eiffel Tower. They
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: were in Paris over the weekend for the inauguration of
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  Speaker 2: a Hindu temple. In a statement, the group apologized and
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: said they did not mean to offend or inconvenience anyone.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Now let's bring in Christophe Jaffrelot. He's a research director
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: at CERI and president of the French Political Science Association.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: He's a specialist on South Asia, particularly India and Pakistan. Christophe,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: just tell us, how did this scandal evolve?
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  Speaker 4: Well, there is a real uproar on the French political
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  Speaker 4: scene politicians of all kinds are protesting that that should
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: have never happened. That, of course, is against the values
• 2:42
  Speaker 4: of the French Republic. And, of course, the risk is
• 2:50
  Speaker 4: a kind of exploitation of this issue for... Xenophobic reasons. But, well, understandably,
• 3:00
  Speaker 4: it does really create a lot of commotion.
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  Speaker 1: Now, can you tell us more about this particular group
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  Speaker 1: of Hindus, the BAPS, as they are called?
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  Speaker 4: Yes, it's a sect of Hinduism. You know, they claim
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  Speaker 4: to represent Hinduism. They claim that their temples are Hindu temples.
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  Speaker 4: But there is no Hindu god in these temples. there
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  Speaker 4: is the statue of the guru who founded this sect
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  Speaker 4: and his disciples. This is a sect that was created
• 3:38
  Speaker 4: in Gujarat, in Western India, in the 19th century. It's
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  Speaker 4: a rather recent movement. They claim to be also traditional,
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  Speaker 4: but in fact, they are rather modern. And this is
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  Speaker 4: probably where the misunderstanding arises. They don't represent Hinduism. They
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: represent a very conservative sectarian movement.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: Now, let's get back to this misunderstanding that some manager
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: told staff to keep women out of the way of
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: this visitor group. Was that just some overzealous manager who
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: has gotten his priorities wrong?
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  Speaker 4: No, this is the standard practice. Priests of this movement
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  Speaker 4: are not supposed to encounter women. That's really part of
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  Speaker 4: the practices that this movement observes and that is well known.
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  Speaker 4: It's very easy to know that you have to factor
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  Speaker 4: that in when you bring priests from this movement in
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  Speaker 4: a Western society. It's bound to result in intentions on
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  Speaker 4: that front at least.
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  Speaker 1: Now why is this then such a big issue now
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  Speaker 1: and how is this issue currently discussed in the French public?
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  Speaker 4: Well it's a big issue because it's a big event.
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  Speaker 4: It's a really big event. Over several days thousands of
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: devotees are in Paris. There was a very large procession
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  Speaker 4: across Paris. And the woman at the helm of the
• 5:31
  Speaker 4: region of Paris, Valérie Pécresse, was involved, presided over some
• 5:39
  Speaker 4: of the functions. And As a result, of course, the
• 5:45
  Speaker 4: shock is rather large because with all this very spectacular,
• 5:52
  Speaker 4: I would say, festival, you have this scam. You can't
• 6:00
  Speaker 4: speak it. You can't describe it otherwise. And of course,
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  Speaker 4: politicians are exploiting it. So that's also... a reason for the,
• 6:11
  Speaker 4: I would say, discussions, debates. We are in a political
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  Speaker 4: campaign already, electoral campaign already. So everything is politicised.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: Christophe Jaffrelot there, speaking to us from Paris. Thank you
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: very much.