A lawsuit filed against microblogging site Twitter has alleged that it disproportionately targeted women for layoffs last month, Reuters reported on Thursday.
On October 27, billionaire Elon Musk completed his $44 billion (over Rs 3,36,910 crore) takeover of Twitter, following which he cut about half of its workforce. The lawsuit alleging disproportionate targeting of female employees was filed by two women whose employment was terminated by Twitter last month.
The lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in a federal court in San Francisco, said that Twitter laid off 57% of its female workers, compared with 47% of men. It also said that in engineering roles, 63% of women were laid off as against 48% of men.
The plaintiffs have also accused the company of contravening federal and California laws banning workplace discrimination on the basis of sex.
“It’s not a huge surprise unfortunately that women were hit so hard by these layoffs when Elon Musk was overseeing these incredibly ad hoc layoffs just in a matter of days,” Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer for the plaintiffs said, reported The Guardian.
Twitter is also facing lawsuits with respect to its alleged failure to provide proper notices about layoffs to workers and contractors. Some plaintiffs have also alleged that Musk’s demands that employees should return to offices and work long hours discriminated against disabled workers.
Three workers have also claimed that they faced retaliation for seeking better working conditions at Twitter. They have filed complaints against the company with the US National Labor Relations Board, reported The Guardian.
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