Delhi Commonwealth Games: Who Is At Fault?

Delhi Commonwealth Games: Who Is at Fault?

Almost rhyming with 'pride and prejudice,' the making of the venue that started with 'We'll do better than China' has now ended up in 'shame on the country.' In fact it is such that while the principle said 'India is a confident rising economy', which even made British PM ditch Pakistan, practice said 'Manchester City did it but India, as a country, is struggling'. Nothing being national these days - thanks to the satellite TV, while its local hostel pictures went international, it came back with 'international' 'India should not have been offered the chance to host.' Beyond just prestige doing a 'gone with the wind', with it being followed by 'Investors will have less confidence' even the economy is at risk of following suit. Although the ideal of preparation demanded secure construct, security, cleanliness, and finishing touches before arrival of guests, while collapsed construct, intimidated girl players, shot tourists, dirt, and finishing touches after the arrivals of players gave India the beating, with all things connected, almost as an infectious disease, even Formula One got the Indian heat. Suddenly 'Our game will not be like that' appeared. Realising that there are problems, India's Prime Minister swung into action and an army of cleaners appeared and army itself helped with a bridge, long after the arrival of reluctant players the venue is still not ready. Snake choosing a wrong residence has not helped. With less things appearing right and blame always appearing when things go wrong, before even the actual game, almost as an inaugural event, blame game started. While the organizing committee got 'incompetent', 'corrupt,' and 'inept,' the PM got 'what was he doing before?' Although the former, additionally, got 'they should be shot,' the PM was lucky. Indian media suddenly has gone 'responsible' and criticism has died down, and unlike the shooting in the games, that shooting is postponed till after the games, one lamented 'China did a splendid job because they knew they'd get shot if things went wrong, our ones don't get shot'. While history suggests India had 7 years to put its acts together, a foreign member of the organizing committee did alert about the short comings last year and ground realities dint say 'All is well', graph showed Indian media and intellectual outcry only after world media showed unclean rooms and reluctance of participants. With corruption and bureaucracy being rampant and delays expected, I see the incompetence of the blamed institutes as expected, and therefore, less important. Noting the graph, however, I squarely put the blame on Indian media and intellectuals. But why blame these unpaid entities? Although apathy towards the Commonwealth is mentioned, once it is taken, it is a job to be done with responsibly. In fact, when done with an eye on the Olympics and to show the world what India can do, it was a national prestige issue - enough to be defended by the media that considers itself fourth pillar of the country and the intellectuals who guide it. A poet once said 'In China you can eat but you cannot talk; in India you can speak as much as you like but you can't eat,' what worries me most, as suggested by the graph, is the silence of the media and the intellectuals before this outcry, and the outcry occurring only after western media alerted them. Why didn't the media and the intellectuals nationalise the issue, through sting operations and voices, long before it went international? Why is there a dependence on external views? If organisers had 7 years to complete, they had the same time to critique. ----------------------------------------------