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A well written article , with some hard hitting truths ..worth sharing.
Hope I have posted it in the right location.
Games reveal best and worst of India | The Australian
IN the end Delhi surprised with new sporting heroes and pride restored.
SOMEWHERE between the gorgeous chaos of the opening ceremony and the stunning final week performances of local track and field athletes this week, Indian public opinion flipped in favour of Delhi's Commonwealth Games.
And just like that India's media forgot months of its own harsh criticism of the problem-plagued event and turned its attention to the alleged Western conspiracy to besmirch the good name of this emerging superpower.
Asked this week by an obliging local journalist whether he believed adverse foreign press coverage - of errant snakes and monkeys, a collapsed footbridge, shambolic ticketing and athlete illness - pointed to such a conspiracy, Delhi Organising Committee chairman Suresh Kalmadi replied brusquely, "No comment."
The Times of India, which for months had filled its pages with Commonwealth Games scandals, questioned whether the West just found the narrative of "bumbling Indians" more entertaining than a nuanced picture of a gracious host trying to overcome glitches and keep its guests happy.
It's a fair question.
No one is harsher on India's failings than Indians but, equally, there's not a sovereign nation in the world that wouldn't buck at the criticism it received in the lead-up to the Games.
Yet middle-class India's enthusiastic embrace of its own success story has made it thin-skinned when it comes to subjects that contradict the narrative of an emerging economic superpower. And the cringing spotlight shone in recent weeks on some of modern India's weaknesses has certainly done that.
India had hoped to make the Commonwealth Games the springboard through which it sold its "Shining India" narrative to the West and finally eradicated the image of a nation of beggars and slums, much as China and South Africa revealed new modern faces through the Olympics and this year's soccer World Cup.
To its collective horror, the preparations for the event - marred by tales of labour exploitation, shoddy workmanship at venues, corruption and comical denials - had the opposite effect.
As one Indian columnist wrote this month: "As hard as we try to build a new India . . . old India still has the power to humiliate and embarrass us."
If there's one thing the Commonwealth Games has done for India it's to give it a sense of itself as an emerging sporting nation.
The country, which until now has survived on a limited sporting diet of cricket and hockey, has discovered a new enthusiasm for sports as local athletes racked up medals in previously unheralded fields.
India won 101 medals, 38 of them gold, and - perhaps more important - a symbolic tussle with its former English colonial masters for second place in the medal tally.
As the much criticised Kalmadi noted at the final Games press conference this week: "It was a great Games for the Indian contingent, as we have almost doubled our medal tally.
"Over 75 Games records have been shattered. New champions have emerged. India, too, has got new young sporting icons and that's good for sports."
But old India could not be suppressed. Even as the mood lightened this week in direct proportion to India's rising medal haul, and Indian financial markets celebrated record foreign institutional investment, the nation woke to news it had been ranked 67th of 84 countries - lower even than Sudan - by the latest Global Hunger Index, which found 42 per cent of the world's undernourished children live in India.
Last month Moody's Analytics - a leading investment assessment house - warned the chaos surrounding Delhi's preparations for the Commonwealth Games was spoiling investor confidence in India.
"It had been hoped a multi-billion-dollar investment in the Commonwealth Games would spur economic activity in 2010," Moody's Sydney-based senior economist Matt Robinson warned. "Instead the current debacle, less than a fortnight before the Games are to begin, risks tarnishing the event and embarrassing the organisers and the country as a whole.
"Confidence in India's infrastructure, its capacity to organise large events and its reputation as a tourist destination have all been brought into question."
For a nation hoping to triple its direct foreign investment to $US100 billion ($101bn) by 2017 to help finance the roads, ports, utilities and airports it needs, that was not welcome news.
Some of the most scathing reviews of India's performance came from Indians.
Manu Joseph from India's Open Magazine wrote this month that the most expensive Commonwealth Games in history - costing anything from $2bn to $6bn - "exposed a country that was at its heart inefficient, callous and corrupt".
"No other country has spent so much money to expose its true character to the world," she wrote.
Has India's Commonwealth Games really ruined its reputation? That this giant democracy located in one of the world's most unstable regions managed to avert a large-scale terror attack in the face of serious threats from regional militants is in itself a mark of success.
Delhiites grumbled about suffocating security, but after gunmen opened fire on tourists in Old Delhi just weeks before the Games the city was taking no chances.
In closing remarks, which attempted to put a line under continuing tensions between the Commonwealth Games Federation and the Delhi Organising Committee, federation president Mike Fennell said the Games, and particularly televised events such as the marathon and cycling road races, had showcased Delhi and India to the world.
Certainly, if the jubilant capacity crowd at Thursday night's closing ceremony was any indication, Indians feel they have answered their critics.
"People were very worried that India would not be able to do it nicely but we have done it and people should change their thinking," said Sanjay Dina Patil, who travelled from Mumbai to watch the event.
"We're ready for other big events and next time our mistakes won't be repeated."
Even Moody's Robinson has come around.
"Certainly the lead-up was not particularly good and my point was more that something that looks bad can't be good for your reputation. But they seem to have pulled off a pretty successful actual staging of the event," he tells Focus. "There's still enormous opportunity and potential within the country because it's a population of one billion that needs extraordinary amounts of infrastructure and investment, and it has the capacity to sustain high levels of growth."
Richard McDonald knows well the highs and lows of working within the Indian system.
His Australian-listed Taiyo Membrane company has put roofing on India's three busiest airports - Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad - and is responsible for the striking blue-lit sails on the refurbished Jawaharlal Nehru stadium that have become an admired addition to Delhi's skyline. But even for a laid-back West Australian surfer the going has been tough and he says the stories of Games chaos coming out of Delhi could deter some investors.
"From an international perspective it looks bad. For people who hadn't been before and came a month or two ahead of the Games the reaction was generally, 'My god, it really is as bad as it looks,' " he says.
"But India's attitude is it will get done if you throw enough people at it. It's probably scared off some investors, but I think they'll probably reassess in six or 12 months because there's double-digit growth coming out of this region."
It will be interesting to see how Indian authorities deal with those responsible for the mismanagement and corruption now that the Games have ended and the spotlight is off. Perhaps the true test for India is not whether it has sold a modern, transparent image to the rest of the world, but whether it can prove it to its own population.
Hope I have posted it in the right location.
Games reveal best and worst of India | The Australian
IN the end Delhi surprised with new sporting heroes and pride restored.
SOMEWHERE between the gorgeous chaos of the opening ceremony and the stunning final week performances of local track and field athletes this week, Indian public opinion flipped in favour of Delhi's Commonwealth Games.
And just like that India's media forgot months of its own harsh criticism of the problem-plagued event and turned its attention to the alleged Western conspiracy to besmirch the good name of this emerging superpower.
Asked this week by an obliging local journalist whether he believed adverse foreign press coverage - of errant snakes and monkeys, a collapsed footbridge, shambolic ticketing and athlete illness - pointed to such a conspiracy, Delhi Organising Committee chairman Suresh Kalmadi replied brusquely, "No comment."
The Times of India, which for months had filled its pages with Commonwealth Games scandals, questioned whether the West just found the narrative of "bumbling Indians" more entertaining than a nuanced picture of a gracious host trying to overcome glitches and keep its guests happy.
It's a fair question.
No one is harsher on India's failings than Indians but, equally, there's not a sovereign nation in the world that wouldn't buck at the criticism it received in the lead-up to the Games.
Yet middle-class India's enthusiastic embrace of its own success story has made it thin-skinned when it comes to subjects that contradict the narrative of an emerging economic superpower. And the cringing spotlight shone in recent weeks on some of modern India's weaknesses has certainly done that.
India had hoped to make the Commonwealth Games the springboard through which it sold its "Shining India" narrative to the West and finally eradicated the image of a nation of beggars and slums, much as China and South Africa revealed new modern faces through the Olympics and this year's soccer World Cup.
To its collective horror, the preparations for the event - marred by tales of labour exploitation, shoddy workmanship at venues, corruption and comical denials - had the opposite effect.
As one Indian columnist wrote this month: "As hard as we try to build a new India . . . old India still has the power to humiliate and embarrass us."
If there's one thing the Commonwealth Games has done for India it's to give it a sense of itself as an emerging sporting nation.
The country, which until now has survived on a limited sporting diet of cricket and hockey, has discovered a new enthusiasm for sports as local athletes racked up medals in previously unheralded fields.
India won 101 medals, 38 of them gold, and - perhaps more important - a symbolic tussle with its former English colonial masters for second place in the medal tally.
As the much criticised Kalmadi noted at the final Games press conference this week: "It was a great Games for the Indian contingent, as we have almost doubled our medal tally.
"Over 75 Games records have been shattered. New champions have emerged. India, too, has got new young sporting icons and that's good for sports."
But old India could not be suppressed. Even as the mood lightened this week in direct proportion to India's rising medal haul, and Indian financial markets celebrated record foreign institutional investment, the nation woke to news it had been ranked 67th of 84 countries - lower even than Sudan - by the latest Global Hunger Index, which found 42 per cent of the world's undernourished children live in India.
Last month Moody's Analytics - a leading investment assessment house - warned the chaos surrounding Delhi's preparations for the Commonwealth Games was spoiling investor confidence in India.
"It had been hoped a multi-billion-dollar investment in the Commonwealth Games would spur economic activity in 2010," Moody's Sydney-based senior economist Matt Robinson warned. "Instead the current debacle, less than a fortnight before the Games are to begin, risks tarnishing the event and embarrassing the organisers and the country as a whole.
"Confidence in India's infrastructure, its capacity to organise large events and its reputation as a tourist destination have all been brought into question."
For a nation hoping to triple its direct foreign investment to $US100 billion ($101bn) by 2017 to help finance the roads, ports, utilities and airports it needs, that was not welcome news.
Some of the most scathing reviews of India's performance came from Indians.
Manu Joseph from India's Open Magazine wrote this month that the most expensive Commonwealth Games in history - costing anything from $2bn to $6bn - "exposed a country that was at its heart inefficient, callous and corrupt".
"No other country has spent so much money to expose its true character to the world," she wrote.
Has India's Commonwealth Games really ruined its reputation? That this giant democracy located in one of the world's most unstable regions managed to avert a large-scale terror attack in the face of serious threats from regional militants is in itself a mark of success.
Delhiites grumbled about suffocating security, but after gunmen opened fire on tourists in Old Delhi just weeks before the Games the city was taking no chances.
In closing remarks, which attempted to put a line under continuing tensions between the Commonwealth Games Federation and the Delhi Organising Committee, federation president Mike Fennell said the Games, and particularly televised events such as the marathon and cycling road races, had showcased Delhi and India to the world.
Certainly, if the jubilant capacity crowd at Thursday night's closing ceremony was any indication, Indians feel they have answered their critics.
"People were very worried that India would not be able to do it nicely but we have done it and people should change their thinking," said Sanjay Dina Patil, who travelled from Mumbai to watch the event.
"We're ready for other big events and next time our mistakes won't be repeated."
Even Moody's Robinson has come around.
"Certainly the lead-up was not particularly good and my point was more that something that looks bad can't be good for your reputation. But they seem to have pulled off a pretty successful actual staging of the event," he tells Focus. "There's still enormous opportunity and potential within the country because it's a population of one billion that needs extraordinary amounts of infrastructure and investment, and it has the capacity to sustain high levels of growth."
Richard McDonald knows well the highs and lows of working within the Indian system.
His Australian-listed Taiyo Membrane company has put roofing on India's three busiest airports - Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad - and is responsible for the striking blue-lit sails on the refurbished Jawaharlal Nehru stadium that have become an admired addition to Delhi's skyline. But even for a laid-back West Australian surfer the going has been tough and he says the stories of Games chaos coming out of Delhi could deter some investors.
"From an international perspective it looks bad. For people who hadn't been before and came a month or two ahead of the Games the reaction was generally, 'My god, it really is as bad as it looks,' " he says.
"But India's attitude is it will get done if you throw enough people at it. It's probably scared off some investors, but I think they'll probably reassess in six or 12 months because there's double-digit growth coming out of this region."
It will be interesting to see how Indian authorities deal with those responsible for the mismanagement and corruption now that the Games have ended and the spotlight is off. Perhaps the true test for India is not whether it has sold a modern, transparent image to the rest of the world, but whether it can prove it to its own population.
