India’s “filthy” and “empty” Commonwealth Games

I found myself continually exclaiming – “How did they do that?!” Specifically, I marveled at the serene manner in which the Chinese fused 21st Century technology with ancient graphics, costumes, and choreography to remind us that they were the world’s only superpower for centuries before the Americans even thought about fighting the British to give birth to the United States of America.

(Opening Ceremony for Beijing Olympics…, The iPINIONS Journal, August 9, 2008)

Ever since the disintegration of the former Soviet Union in 1991, India and China have been engaged in an open rivalry to assume the mantle as the world’s only other superpower.  Therefore, it is understandable that, in hosting this month’s Commonwealth Games, India wanted to emulate the accolades and respect China won for hosting the 2008 Olympic Games.

Unfortunately, instead of evoking awe and praise like China did, India’s opening ceremony on Sunday was overshadowed by persistent and serious complaints about the third-rate facilities and systemic disorganization that greeted delegations from the 71 mostly former British colonies that comprise the Commonwealth.

Most embarrassing in this respect were the conditions at the athletes’ village.  Here’s how the Financial Times reported on this while athletes were already moving in:

Mike Hooper, chief executive of the Commonwealth Games Federation, described the accommodation at the games village in Delhi as “filthy” and “uninhabitable”. He said his organisation would no longer pull any punches over the shortcomings in India’s preparations for the games.

But this was only one of many glitches that made India seem every bit the dysfunctional, destitute and disorganized Third World colossus it, evidently, still is. For there was also the notorious collapse, just days before the opening ceremony, of a metal pedestrian bridge at the celebrated Jawaharlal Nehru stadium, which injured as many as 25 people.

Naturally, this raised concerns that the main venues might have been built in a slipshod fashion that could cause them to crumble at any moment too. These concerns were only reinforced the very next day (on September 22) when fake roofing in the ceiling of Nehru stadium collapsed into the competitors area of the weightlifting venue.  Not to mention the rumors of corruption that hovered like a dark cloud over preparations from day one.

Then there was a bomb scare yesterday that conjured up unsettling memories of coordinated terrorist attacks across Mumbai in 2008, including on the Taj Mahal Palace, during which a ragtag bunch of terrorists held India’s national security forces at bay for three days while they systematically killed over 170 people and wounded over 300. 

And to top things off, late-breaking reports of an outbreak of the deadly dengue fever has officials fumigating the athletes’ village with insect repellant – with all of the health risks that entails….

Meanwhile, the only thing newsworthy about the actual events that have taken place so far is the fact that they have been virtually devoid of spectators.  You’d think the very least the Indian organizers could do was to recruit enough of the one billion people at their disposal to fill the stands in a show of national pride. 

Yet here’s the ass-backwards way the local organizing committee chairman, Suresh Kalmadi, addressed this incomprehensible shortcoming during an interview with the London Guardian yesterday:

We are working on the children from schools. Already steps are being taken in that direction. And also from the low level of society.

Only God knows when these school children and poor dregs will be planted into the empty stands at venues around Delhi. But the Indians have infuriated even their well-intentioned critics by responding to all complaints with the mantra, “Don’t worry, everything is under control“.  Never mind that the Games might be over before there’s any discernable truth to this.

So here’s to China for making India look hopelessly Third World – as least in so far as hosting international sporting (and cultural) events are concerned.

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