India's chaotic Commonwealth Games starts to come together (Feature)

Oct 1, 2010, 9:48 GMT

New Delhi - The kerbs are painted, vuvuzelas are selling, tickets aren't and the traffic is snarled as thousands of athletes travel across Delhi for the 2010 Commonwealth Games due to open Sunday.

After weeks of will it, won't it - India looks ready to pull off the games - in its own chaotic way. Not quite the smooth show that it hoped would signal the country's arrival as an economic power on the global scene.

The preparations for the games have showcased instead the many ills the fast-growing developing nation still struggles with. Corruption, cronyism, shoddy infrastructure and a lack of quality control.

The crisis peaked with 10 days to go when Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) chief Mike Fennell complained that officials of several participating nations felt conditions made the athletes' village unlivable.

To add to the woes, a footbridge at a venue collapsed injuring several workers and two Taiwanese visitors were shot and injured by unidentified gunmen all in the same week.

Delhi's dengue season, too, looks ready to peak with the number of people contracting the disease since June crossing 3,000.

Photographs of stained toilets and paw marks on mattresses led to outrage across India and Commonwealth nations, many of which held their teams back until things were sorted out.

An increasingly aspirational Indian middle class was furious. India's 'shame games,' said the local media and bloggers, many of them Indians settled abroad, were outraged by how the government and organizers had let the country down.

The preparations added to the misery of Delhi's poorer residents as hundreds of people were pushed out of slums and forced to return to their villages.

The thousands of workers at the games venues worked for less than minimum wages, had little safety equipment, no toilet facilities on site and make-shift shacks and plastic tents to house them after a hard day's work. At least 42 workers were killed on games sites.

Given the barrage of negative news, some individual athletes pulled out, but not any of the 71 participating nations. Drawing on its biggest asset, manpower, the Indian government got 1,100 cleaners in to do the mop up act with just days remaining.

On Wednesday, with three days to go, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said the work was more or less complete. Delhi Police chief YS Dadwal said the venues had been finally handed over and a security lock down was in progress.

With threats of a terrorist attack always on the horizon, India has pulled out 100,000 police and paramilitary personnel to stand guard at the capital while the games takes place. A multilayer security cover including air surveillance will be in place for the two-week games.

Athletes arriving in the village seemed pleasantly surprised. 'The games village is impressive. Since we have arrived, we have been treated to some of the best facilities ever in terms of dining and accommodation,' IANS news agency quoted Daryl Selby, a member of the English squash team as saying.

Australia's Anna Maree Meares, an Olympic cycling gold medalist, was awed by the security. 'It was certainly different getting on to a bus and seeing all the military guys with the guns. But actually it made us more comfortable,' Meares said. The South African team's media spokesman Mark Keohane said he felt safer in Delhi than Cape Town.

The focus now is on the opening ceremony which involves 6,000 performers showcasing Indian culture in a two-hour extravaganza, organizing committee officials said.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II will not be opening the games in her capacity as head of the Commonwealth nations, her first miss since 1966. Her son prince Charles would be officiating in her place.