A woman was left stranded in a foreign country when a hotel refused to let her check in because she was single.
Nupur Saraswat, a spoken word artist from Singapore, traveled to the city of Hyderabad in southern India for a performance when she was told by her hotel that “single ladies” were not allowed to stay there.
“Somehow they decided I was safer on the streets than in the hotel. Funny huh, how patriarchy works?” she wrote.
The post, which she encouraged others to share, has now been shared more than 1,600 times and “liked” more than 2,800 times on the social network.
According to the Hotel Deccan Erragadda’s policies, “locals and unmarried couples” are also not allowed.
Saraswat had booked to the hotel via a popular third-party booking website, Goibibo. The hotel-booking site has since apologized for the incident, refunded her booking, and offered her a complimentary stay in a different hotel for the duration of her stay in Hyderabad.
But the Hotel has since denied the policy, saying that the supposed policy was in response to police advice about the area not being “right” for single women.
“As per local police interaction we don’t give rooms to single women and unmarried couples,” the statement read.
Saraswat said that when the room was booked, the finer details of the hotel’s policy — which clearly state that single women, locals and unmarried couples are not allowed to stay — were not understood. However, she still believes that the policy itself is unacceptable.
“But of course, there are also those who have tried to silence this by asking ‘why are you making a fuss if it’s clearly stated in the policy?’”
“Well I am making a fuss because I am not ready to settle. I am not ready to live in the fear of my safety anymore. I am not ready to have an entire system push me around until I ‘find a man to travel with.’ I AM NOT READY TO BE CHAPERONED,” she wrote.