CommonWealth Games 2010

The Delhi Police's fire depart- ment has claimed that the build- ing is yet to receive a `no objec- tion clearance'.

The clearance is mandatory to occupy the building. Iro- nically, the building was occu- pied almost eight months ago.

Earlier, the Delhi Urban Arts Commission and the architect of the building came down heav- ily on the Games panel for the `pink and purple wrap' adorn- ing the façade.

Generally, the fire depart- ment issues the NOC or clear- ance certificate to any building after it is fully constructed.

After the go-ahead from the fire department, the municipal body concerned -- in this case the NDMC -- issues an occu- pancy certificate.

Fire department officials had inspected the building in January and found that it did not meet all requirements. "To obtain a clearance cer- tificate, a building must have in place a certain number of exit points, an efficient fire detec- tion system, extinguishers, smoke management system, alarms among others," said G.C.
Mishra, Chief Fire Officer. According to sources, it was found that a lot of exit points in the building were blocked and it did not have a proper detec- tion system.

neelam.pandey@hindustantimes.com

Source: Hindustan Times By Neelam Pandey Commonwealth Games : Games HQ Fails Fire Safety Test, Yet To Get No-Objection Certificate

Speaking at an interaction `Face to Face with Government' with the FICCI Ladies Organisation, Special Secretary to the Chief Minister P K Tripathi drew parallel with the 2008 Beijing Olympics, where, he said, the number of international visitors fell short of "speculation".

Tripathi said, "There was serious speculation even during the Beijing Olympics (about high number of visitors) but hotel occupancy was ultimately only 25 per cent. International tourists do not generally come in huge numbers during October as it is not the holiday season for them."

Tripathi, however, said Delhi will not face a shortage of hotel rooms during the October 3-14 event: "I am sure we will have enough hotels for those who come."

Delhi Chief Secretary Rakesh Mehta, who was also present at the function, said, "There are no issues regarding arrangements during the Games except, may be, security. (But) even security is not much of a problem as there is a fairly elaborate multiple-tier security arrangement."

Source: The Indian Express `Not many foreign visitors for Games'

The Commonwealth Games (CWG) Oct 3-14 have been allocated Rs 2,069 crore, earmarking Rs.378 crore for the preparation of teams.

Welcoming the budget proposals of 2010-11, Union Youth Affairs and Sports Minister M S Gill said: "I am very happy that the finance minister consistently supported sports and the CWG. I am fully funded."

The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) and the Sports Authority of India (SAI) are allocated Rs 1,175.54 crore while Rs.30 crore go for the equipments and furnishings of stadia.

For the high definition coverage of the Games, the government has allocated Rs 82 crore.

The government has also taken a serious note of doping in sports and set aside Rs 11.50 crore for National Dope Test Laboratory, Rs.3 crore for National Anti-Doping Agency, and Rs 50 lakh for World Anti-Doping Agency.

The National Sports Development Fund will have Rs 15 crore.

Official sources said the Commission has asked all its vigilance officials posted with  agencies concerned  to "double check" the procedures involved in the procurment and other aspects of the projects.

The decision comes following complaints alleging discrepancies in the work being undertaken by the civic agencies like Municipal Corporation of Delhi, New Delhi Municipal Corporation, Delhi Development Authority and Central Public Works Development among others.

The complainants have alleged since many projects were running beyond their schedule there were chances of corruption while completing these projects on time.

"We have received some complaints regarding alleged corruption in Commonwealth Games projects. As a preventive measure, we have directed all our Chief Vigilance Officers (CVOs) in all the departments to be cautious and ensure transparency in the process," a CVC official, who did not wish to be identified, said.

Source: Business-standard CWG projects under CVC scanner

Giving this information here todat, Tourism Minister O P Jain said that a number of steps had been taken by the Tourism Department to provide all basic facilities to the players and visitors during the ensuing Commonwealth Games.

The Minister said for the first time, the Tourism Minister has been awarded the best Tourism Minister Award by Pacific Area Travel Writers Association (PATWA). He further said that innovations introduced by Haryana Tourism had also been recognised by travel and trade.

Jain said recently award for best State for Conservation and Preservation of Heritage had also been given to Haryana by 5th Hospitality India and Explore the World Annual International Awards-2009. He said that Haryana Tourism had also introduced on-line room booking system at the important tourist complexes of Haryana Tourism.

The Tourism Minister said Red Bishop, Panchkula tourist complex was also being expanded and two acres of land had already been allocated for this purpose for setting up of a new convention centre and a sum of Rs 5.73 crore had been sanctioned for this purpose.

Jain said the Haryana Tourism had also taken a number of other steps to promote tourism in the State which included conservation of old motel and Rani Mahal at Yadavindra Gardens, Pinjore, construction of food court and parking at Pinjore and maintainence of musical fountain at Tilyar lake, Rohtak and restoration of Bhima Devi Temple Museum at Pinjore.

"There are plans to integrate the Delhi Metro and the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) services so that all spectators can commute effortlessly and conveniently between different locations in and around Delhi. The ticketed spectators will be entitled for free public transport, on DTC buses and Delhi metro, valid for the day of the competition," a statement from the committee said.

The 2010 Commonwealth Games will take place in the capital Oct 3-14.

According to the organising committee, there are also proposals to introduce a special fleet of buses for the games, regular shuttle service to and from various metro stations near the games' venue and free travel passes for volunteers.

"To ferry spectators to and from different games' venues, DTC will be providing a special bus fleet consisting of more than 600 compressed natural gas (CNG) fuelled buses. The organising committee and the DTC has also identified various points from where the buses will pick and drop passengers and for this Delhi will be divided into five zones," the statement said.

According to the release, around 100,000 foreign tourists are expected to come to the city for the games in addition to Indian tourists.

Present on the occasion were Mr. Suresh Kalmadi, MP & Chairman, Organising Committee Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi, Mrs. Sheila Dikshit, Chief Minister of Delhi, Mr. Mike Hooper, CEO, Commonwealth Federation, Mr. Graeme Hudson, President, Commonwealth Shooting Federation among others.

163 shooters from 12 countries (including 43 from India) are expected to compete in the championship. Shotgun marksmen Adam Vella and Russell Mark of Australia apart from pistol exponents Michael Gault and Nick Baxter of England will be some of the leading shooters who will participate. The Indian contingent will include Samaresh Jung, Gagan Narang, Manavjit Singh Sandhu, Tejaswini Sawant, Lajja Gauswami among others. Apart from India, Australia (25), England (22) and Wales (21), Scotland (13), Bangladesh (11), Gibraltar (8), Northern Ireland (8), Sri Lanka (5), New Zealand (5), Kenya (1) and South Africa (1) are the other countries scheduled to compete.

Suresh Kalmadi, Chairman, Organising Committee Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi welcomed international shooters to India and all shooters to the championship. Conveying his message loudly and clearly to everyone, Mr. Kalmadi said that, "Let there be no doubt in anybody's mind that all Games-related infrastructure will be world-class and will also be ready much ahead of the Commonwealth Games to be held in October."

Source: thesportscampus.com VIII Commonwealth Shooting Federation Championship Inaugurated

So far, no measure has been initiated to fill the two lakes and no wonder the officials are praying to rain god. "We can bring some water to the two lakes but we have no idea of the lakes' capacity. Obviously, the rain will bring some water,'' said a senior irrigation department official.

On Tuesday, the government hinted at a long-term plan for the permanent revival of the two waterbodies. "The NCR Planning Board (NCRPB) officials said that they might approach consultants, who plan revival of parched lakes,'' said chief secretary Urvashi Gulati.

She said that Haryana government would like the NCRPB to include the plan of reviving these two water bodies in its tourism plan for the NCR. "We talked of long-term solution. Blockage of rainwater catchment areas around these lakes and mining had resulted in drying up of the lakes. We are serious about the issue,'' Gulati added. NCRPB member secretary Noor Mohammed also said that some international funding agencies also provide assistance for revival of waterbodies.

Meanwhile, government officials also said that intra-city bus service in Gurgaon would commence soon on public private partnership mode and as many as 400 buses would ply in Gurgaon in the next two years and 600 in the next four years. Government also claimed that 250 CCTV cameras were being installed in Gurgaon and 140 in Faridabad to improve security in these cities.

The Delhi Commonwealth Secretariat has quietly launched a special online lottery series hoping to raise over Rs 500 crore to fund the Games. The lottery, or raffle series, launched last week in 12 states, will continue for the next 23 months, said a top official, requesting anonymity. The top prizes could include luxury cars such as Mercedes, gold coins and cash prizes.

Lottery is a state subject, and some states have banned the practice. The CWG panel has written to these states requesting them to make a one-time exception, said another official. "It's for a good cause," he said, asking not to be named.

In fact, Scotland, which would host the Games in 2014 at Glasgow, has already started working on a lottery draw. The Scottish government plans to raise £150 million, about 50% of the total expenditure. London, which is hosting the 2012 Olympics, is looking to raise £2.2 billion (out of total expenditure of £9.4 billion) through lotteries. For the Beijing Olympics, the China Olympics Sports Lottery raised $140 million.

Source: Economic Times Commonwealth Games may leave you with a jackpot

State government officials said here Sunday that Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda has urged the centre to provide one-time special grant of Rs.312 crore for strengthening the police infrastructure in the NCR.

In addition, an amount of Rs.35.41 crore has been sought by Haryana for achieving integration of infrastructure and security related technology for the Commonwealth Games.

"The proposal for the one-time grant and security needs for the Games have already been submitted to the central government," the officials said.

The CWG will be held in New Delhi from Oct 3 to 14 this year.

The Haryana government has also sought mega city status for the NCR towns of Gurgaon and Faridabad.

Haryana surrounds Delhi on three sides of the NCR. The state is making available nearly 7,000 rooms in hotels and guest houses for visitors coming for the Games.

In the scheme, for which advertising has already begun, interested guesthouse owners can contact the Delhi Tourism department and submit requests for inspection of their establishments.

The advantage? The owners will be entitled to concessions that will be decided in future. Names of the graded guesthouses will be put up on the Tourism Department website, where prospective tourists to the city will be able to check them out.

Visitors will also be able to check the facilities provided beforehand and book accommodation according to budget and necessity.

The guesthouses will be graded according to the kinds of facilities on offer. Availability of attached bathrooms, air-conditioning etc will be awarded more points. Guesthouses that want to register themselves have to be licence-holders of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, New Delhi Municipal Corporation or the Delhi Cantonment Board. A list of the guidelines can be obtained from Room 176, Old Secretariat. The grading will be valid for five years.

Source: The Indian Express By Hamari Jamatia Now, city guesthouses to be graded by Tourism dept

It won't be too unfair to predict that this well-meaning effort by the tourism ministry will meet with little success. One reason is the time frame: it's going to be unleashed in six months, the ministry says. That means the ministry will have just five months before the Games to modify behaviour patterns in Delhi and other tourist locations that are expected to enjoy spin-off benefits.

This brings us to the second problem. For China's government, the behavioural issues were mainly limited to ordering people not to spit at random (the Chinese, like Indians, compulsively expectorate), and providing tips on how to help foreigners. Long before this, many Chinese started to learn English.

In a sense India has a huge advantage over China in that English is not an alien language for most urbanites. But there are much bigger problems that a five-month crash course is unlikely to change. One is basic cleanliness. Most Indian visitors to China will testify to the almost septic cleanliness of that country -- and not only in the gleaming big cities of Beijing and Shanghai but in the pretty smaller towns as well. China's urbanisation is not just faster than India's, it's more civic-minded. No Indian city, and Delhi is not an exception, can credibly make even a small claim to cleanliness.

Source: Business-standard by Kanika Datta Kanika Datta: Tourism ministry's crash course for change

"You are in so much hurry.
We are not finding fault with you. But do not forget the rights of the labourers," said a Bench headed by the Chief Justice ordering appointment of a fourmember committee to look into their welfare.

It will comprise former UN ambassador Arundhati Ghosh, the labour commissioner, labour secretary and a person associated with the NHRC.

The court was hearing a PIL on the plight of 17,000 labourers working day and night in rough weather to make Delhi a world-class city before the Games.

Basing its finding on two surveys, it said the labourers were working and living in highly deplorable conditions.

harish.nair@hindustantimes.com

Source: Hindustan Times By Harish V Nair Court to Games labourers' rescue

A boy struggles to hold up a shovel which is nearly the same size as him. He and the children around him are working alongside their parents at a construction project near the Commonwealth Games stadium

At an age when children in this country are either at home playing or starting out in school these youngsters in India are putting in a day's work on a building site.

Struggling to hold up shovels which are as tall as them, they are helping to build drainage works in front of the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Dehli in time for the Commonwealth Games which takes place this autumn.

They shovel stones into baskets which are then carried away by other children as their parents work nearby on the same construction project.

Parents who bring their children to work on the site have been promised extra bonuses such as money for bread and milk for their children, on top of their normal pay.

Parents who bring their children to work on the site have been promised extra bonuses such as bread and milk, on top of their normal pay

Children and parents also receive an additional meal if both of them work on the site.

The Games are due to be held in the Indian capital from October 3-14, but concerns remain over construction of its sporting and transport infrastructure.

The sheer scale of the project has drawn an enormous population of migrant workers from all over India.

Source: dailymail.co.uk Slaving for the Commonwealth Games: The child labourers put to work building a stadium in India's capital

To acquaint the public with its traffic circulation plan for the Commonwealth Games, the traffic police will barricade and restrict traffic movement on the lane along the central verge of certain roads.

The trial runs are expected to start in mid-February and would continue till the Games.

Special Commissioner of Police (traffic) Ajay Chadha said the first trial is expected to take place on the route the athletes will take from the Indira Gandhi International Airport to reach the Games Village in east Delhi.

Sources said the traffic police might even carry out trials during the hockey World Cup, from February 28 to March 13, on the route the participating teams will take to reach Dhyan Chand Stadium near India Gate from Le Meridian Hotel.

Source: Hindustan Times By Atul Mathur From Feb, sample Games traffic plan -- and narrower roads

They earn lower than the stipulated wage and have no access to even the most basic sanitation and health facilities.

A bench comprising of Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah and Justice R S Endlaw has sought the response of the Sports Authority of India (SAI) and agencies in charge of the construction -- DDA, CPWD, NDMC and MCD - on the PIL filed by People's Union For Democratic Rights, an NGO, by February 3.

The bench asked government counsel Najmi Waziri to take instructions about whether the government can form a committee to oversee the welfare of the labourers, including payment of minimum wages.

Senior lawyer and human rights activist Colin Gonsalves, appearing for the NGO, told the Bench that the plight of the 1982 Asiad workers was also the same, till the Supreme Court intervened on the same NGO's petition and ordered improvement of their conditions.

Source: Hindustan Times CWG Workers In Bad Shape: High Court Says Give Them Basic Wages

Delhi Lieutenant-Governor Tejendra Khanna said there are plans to make concentric layers or sub-zones on the riverbed. He said, "The peripheral layer will allow recreational activities for visitors, like picnics."

Khanna heads the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), which plans land-use of the area.

Yamuna's Delhi course

• Covers a length of 48 km -- 22 km in urban area. Width varies from 1.5 km to 3 km

• Enters city at Palla and exits at Jaitpur, South Delhi

• Zone `O' of DDA's masterplan deals with land-use of riverbed and covers approximately 9,700 hectares

• 7 road bridges, 2 railway bridges, 1 Metro bridge, and 2 fair-weather pontoon bridges cross it

• 22 of city's major drains discharge effluent into it

Khanna chaired a high-level meeting last week in which feasibility and implementation of the plan had been discussed. "There will be three layers on the riverbed," he said. "At the heart of the riverbed, alongside Yamuna, will be a biodiversity zone. There will be no construction here, and visitors will not be allowed to enter. The next layer will be the `interactive zone' -- while heavily forested, people will be allowed to enter this area.

Source: Indian Express By Esha Roy Yamuna bed set for green, tourist-friendly makeover

* On riverbed

The training is being provided by Haryana Institute of Public Administration (HIPA) here.

HIPA will train around 3,500 taxi drivers and 8,000 auto rickshaw drivers before the Games. The training is already on and each participating driver is being given Rs.200 per day.

"These drivers would be our ambassadors, as foreign guests would have to deal with them as soon as they reach Delhi airport. This exercise will ensure courteous and friendly behaviour of auto and taxi drivers with the foreigners coming here," HIPA director Rajni Shekhri Sibbal said Saturday.

"We are imparting training in speaking English, stress management, first aid and the methods of practising yoga while sitting in the vehicle. The drivers would be provided four, three and two stars as per their performance during the training.

"After the successful completion of training, name, contact number and vehicle number of the drivers would be made available on the websites of our tourism ministry, Delhi Police and HIPA, so that anybody can contact them with ease."

Demanding a hike in the the reward amount for medal winners at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, Indian Olympic Association (IOA) senior vice-president VK Malhotra said on Wednesday that the sportspersons had been forgotten in the "mad scramble" around the Capital's preparation for the October 3-14 Games.

"In the 2002 Manchester Games and the Busan Asian Games same year, a gold medallist got Rs 20 lakh. But surprisingly the same was brought down to Rs 10 lakh for the gold medallists of 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games and Doha Asian Games.

"I will meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and request him to raise the amount. They saved some Rs 3 crore by reducing the prize money. But when you spend money like water for infrastructures and other things, why cannot you give the sportspersons their due?" asked Malhotra, who also heads the Archery Association of India.

"The Beijing Olympics is talked about not because of Bird's Nest (stadium) or its swimming pool but because China topped the medal tally there. Here in India, $2 billion is being spent for the Games but we don't have enough money when it comes to the sportspersons," he said.

There is only so much an old man can take. After being pilloried during the Hockey India's payment dispute with its players, president AK Mattoo finally decided he had had enough and stepped down on Sunday.

The veteran sports administrator has not only resigned as head of the national hockey federation, but also from the posts of treasurer of the Indian Olympic Association ( IOA) and the Organising Committee of the Commonwealth Games ( CWG).

There is no doubt that the events of the past few weeks have taken its toll on Mattoo.

Hockey India, already struggling to put its house in order for its elections scheduled for February 7, found itself in the news for all the wrong reasons when the players refused to train for the upcoming World Cup till their dues were cleared.

"' I am very upset with whatever happened over the past few weeks and I have resigned as the president of Hockey India and other federations that I was part of," Mattoo said.

" I have submitted my resignation to Suresh Kalmadi ( president of Indian Olympic Association) and I now want to take retirement from sports administration.

I have served for 40 years and it has been long and fruitful innings.

'" I don't want to name anyone but I was not happy with the way Hockey India was being blamed for no reason and I decided to act accordingly," he added.

Mattoo said categorically that he won't reconsider his decision even if his resignation is not accepted.

" I have made up my mind and don't want to get into all this again." The crisis engulfing the national game was finally resolved when team sponsors Sahara India released an additional Rs one crore to be distributed among the players.

tushar. bhaduri@ mailtoday. in

Source: Mail Today By Tushar Bhaduri Hurt Mattoo quits as Hockey India chief