No monitor for Commonwealth Games

The Centre today ruled out setting up an apex committee to oversee the scandal-ridden Commonwealth Games but assured Parliament it would look into the corruption charges.

Sports minister M.S. Gill rejected a demand from MP Mani Shankar Aiyar for a high-level committee like the one set up for the 1982 Asian Games, saying “these committees serve nothing”.

“With some administrative knowledge of the past that I had, I can say that if more committees could solve things in this country, please have 10 more,” Gill said. He added that a group of ministers was monitoring the progress of the Games preparations.

Urban development minister Jaipal Reddy said there were legal difficulties in appointing an apex body above the organising committee.

“The only organisation which can do it (supervise the Games) is the organising committee in India which entered into an agreement with the Commonwealth Association (Federation). Therefore, the government is not competent to tamper with it,” Reddy said.

The organising committee’s executive board today terminated the controversial contract with Australian firm Sports Marketing and Management (SMAM) for “non performance”.

The company had been hired to raise sponsorships for the Games. Committee secretary-general Lalit Bhanot said the executive board had sought legal opinion before deciding to scrap the contract.

“The executive committee terminated the services of (the company) with immediate effect on the ground of non-performance after giving notice.… We had fixed $122 million to be brought by June 30 but they failed. This is the reason for the termination. Legal opinion says we can terminate (the contract) on a three-day notice.”

Bhanot claimed “not even one rupee has been paid to SMAM” but forgot to mention that the committee had hired and paid the company for raising sponsorships for the 2008 Commonwealth Youth Games in Pune.

All the decisions were taken at an emergency meeting of the executive board, the committee’s top decision-making body, after it received the report of the three-member internal probe panel that Suresh Kalmadi had formed on Tuesday. The board rejected the allegations of over-billing in the purchase/renting of umbrellas, air-conditioners, treadmills and the like.

Bhanot said the board would ask the Central Vigilance Commission — which had exposed the corruption and the substandard construction related to Games projects — and the central public works department “to verify the quality and quantity of the work”.

Gill told the Rajya Sabha his ministry had rejected the proposal by the Kalmadi-headed Indian Olympic Association to bid for the 2019 Asian Games. He said the ministry did not agree with the financial projections submitted by the association based on the 2010 Guangzhou Asiad, which “have little relevance in the context of hosting the Games in India in 2019”.

Gill said that if at all India bid for the 2019 Asiad, the Centre would have to decide if Delhi or another city would host it. He cited how South Korea was hosting Asiads away from its capital to develop smaller cities (Busan in 2002, Incheon in 2014).

As for the Commonwealth Games, Gill said all the 13 major stadiums were ready. “Have faith in India, India will get there.... God is with us.”