India lives up to its well-deserved reputation as the preeminent underachiever among nations. India has a knack for defying the most pessimistic predictions by performing even worse than expected. This sham of a preparation must be unprecedented in the history of the Commonwealth Games, no, the history of sports. I can say with confidence that there has never been such a painfully plodding, incompetently executed, and thoroughly corrupt preparation for an international sporting event, be it the Olympics, the Asiad, the World Cup, or the Commonwealth Games. The incredible India has indeed done the incredible: being a self-proclaimed Great Power while botching a modest sporting event. Even the small nation of Greece, with a sliver of Indias population, has hosted the Olympic Games, which dwarfs the Commonwealth Games not only in scale but also logistical and infrastructural demands. India the super power soon-to-be? Bah! Try India the giant pygmy that cant match the tiny Greece! With a political class of sycophants and incompetents, India would be lucky to hold itself together for another 60 years, much less aspiring to Great Power status.
Speaking of Great Powers, I recall that a few years back, there was voluminous talk in India about catching up with China and surpassing it. Many Indians, driven by delusions of grandeur, flooded the Internet forums, belching the India Shining balderdash as unremittingly as the Gulf oil spill. Ever since the Chinese hosted the Beijing Olympics, which was an astounding display of Chinas organizational and sporting prowess, the Indian pastime of fantasizing about overtaking China has suffered a precipitous decline. Through the Beijing Olympics, the Indians caught a glimpse of reality, which sharply moderated their false pride. The Indian ego was further deflated by the release of Slumdog Millionaire, which allowed the Western movie audiences a rare peek into the real India, whose grotesquery had hitherto been obscured by decades of Gandhian sanctimony and more recently, a thick layer of triumphalist maquillage. Now comes the Commonwealth Games fiasco, the last play in a trifecta of crushing publicity, and it may just do the impossible: muzzling the famously motor-mouthed Indians and putting their silly delusions to rest. No wonder India was fated to discover zero, for India is a ZERO!
