But we are the exception rather than the rule

Highway on stilts brand new linking the Games Village to the big stage does not collapse; the opening ceremony was not victim of a massive power outage; the results of the first tests were able to be registered normally: the Commonwealth Games began Sunday without catastrophe and the Indian authorities take to hope that they will be properly until the close of October 14. After the accumulation of frustration in September, the considerable delay in some sites until the collapse of a footbridge from an outbreak of dengue fever, from games without incident would constitute an unhoped-for success so much is the initial ambitions...

The streets of Delhi have an appearance although unusual, in this first week of the Commonwealth Games, which bring together some 7,000 athletes and officials from 71 nations and territories of the former British Empire. On many avenues, two files remain empty for official vehicles to traverse the city at high speed - quite impossible feat otherwise. The crowd to press on all new subway lines, as many buses, too dilapidated to make good impression, were removed from circulation. Along the streets, huge banners celebrating the great international celebration of the sport - and conveniently mask an unfinished site, a deposit of detritus or camp of misery. In this setting that blends authentic stories and "Potemkin village", it barely remember that these Commonwealth Games had to be the Indian capital that were the 2008 Olympics to Beijing.

The India is satisfied, the third millennium belongs to him. And nothing of the kind, for this country which now claims as a giant economic and political, that an international sports event of foreground to display its new status in the face of the world. The India therefore was very difficult in 2003 for the Organization of these 19esJeux. With the idea to the time a capital "of international class", also beautiful modern. A Beijing sauce curry, somehow.

Some spectacular successes

Contrary to what the media have been able to believe, the bet was relieved to some extent. The most spectacular innovation: Delhi is now covered by a subway, air more often, excellent invoice. The view of a trainset ultramodern subway passing at high speed a few meters over an avenue crowded by the usual chaos cars, trucks, motor or pedal rickshaws will become characteristic of the Indian capital. While a first section covering 65 kilometres had been opened a few years ago, a flowering of new lines were inaugurated, in recent weeks, for a total of 125 additional kilometres. Even if the line serving the great stage worked a few hours before the opening ceremony and the opening of the crucial line serving the airport has been postponed after the end of the games, the city is located has for the first time to a worthy of the name mass transport.

Another major addition: the New Delhi airport terminal, almost a new airport to him alone since it will consolidate most of the flights, domestic and international. And also: the rapid replacement of a fleet of ramshackle and clumsy bus by modern vehicles with air conditioning. For a little, one is almost tempted to believe Suresh Kalmadi, President of Games Organising Committee, who said before the foreign journalists that, with the airport and new roads, Delhi metro has become "a world-class capital."

Unfortunately, a few indisputable success cannot make us forget the rest. Own site bus network projects are frozen, the rehabilitation of the streets of Delhi is for the less risky, with causeways newly redone during summer where holes appeared in the first rain. The ambitions of development of the historic heritage resulted in the illumination of a few monuments. Connaught Place, monumental square in the heart of the British "New Delhi", has regained its luster with a lot of fresh paint, but a good part of its renovation has been postponed. As the "Streetscape" operation, it sway the Delhiwalas (the inhabitants of the capital) between laughter and tears: the pieces of pavement redone here, new signage, but consistency or continuity and always omnipresent urban chaos.

In addition, the conditions in which have been carried out this work warrant any fears. "The games is for fifteen days, infrastructure is forever!" said Lalit Bhanot, Secretary General of the Organizing Committee for the games, a few days before a new bridge connecting grand stage of the city in a parking lot, not collapsed.

The preparation of the Commonwealth Games Delhi actually reveals serious problems. And in any first a complete lack of coordination. The city depends on an administrative organization cascade, with skills of the Delhi Development Authority (connected to the Indian State), the State of Delhi and the municipality. "For a same public site, five agencies at least will intervene, for the land, building permit, construction itself, connections to electricity, etc.," says architect Gautam Bhatia. As there is no coordination and that "the various members of the same administration refuse to talk, we pit walls all new to install electric cables and is repeated two or three times on the sidewalks", he says. "There need excellent integration" transport systems, adds Anumita Roychowdhury of the Centre for Science and Environment, for example deplores the subway to work "in complete isolation", without that nothing is done to facilitate access and coordinate it with other means of transport.

An exorbitant cost

Similarly, as there is no single guardianship, "nobody knows how much these games cost", says Shivani Chaudhry of the NGO Housing and Land Rights Network, who has devoted much effort to identify expenditures. Figures the most various travel, covering extremely variable perimeters. Interviewed by "Les echos", Suresh Kalmadi says that all of the expenses incurred is of the order of EUR 6.5 billion, not counting the two mega-projects of the subway and the airport. If one adds about 3 billion for the first and 2 billion for the second, it is more than 11 billion euros. A huge sum for a country which still has some of the poorest regions of the world. "It should also tell us where this money has been taken," launches Shivani Chaudhry, whose organization has denounced the embezzlement scandal for the benefit of the games of funds for the improvement of the fate of untouchables. The NGO also noted numerous abuses of the human rights during the preparation of the feast of the sport: expulsion of the beggars out of the city, children used on some sites, poor hidden in the eyes of foreign visitors...

During the last months, suspicions of corruption have multiplied. During the summer, three officials have been suspended. "When the post-mortem will be after the games, the corruption aspect will surely resurface", says Professor of political science at the University of Delhi Balveer Arora, who said a "major problem: managers do not take decisions when it comes, because too many people have interests at stake." Curiously, even the anti-corruption devices can be counterproductive. "The procurement rules require to take the lowest bidder, says a French professional infrastructure, the time is the least expensive, without requirement no quality."

All this, finally, highlights the serious deficiencies in the functioning of the Indian public sphere. "If it went well for us, said an official of the new airport, it is because we have worked entirely on private funds. But we are the exception rather than the rule. "A study on the impact of the games, the broker CLSA (Crédit Agricole Group) wrote that" the preparation of the games highlighted the worst with the different branches of Government are able to: corruption, dismal performance, opacity, low respect for deadlines and quality. "

Comparison with Beijing, in other words, is cruel. "We have made the work of superficial and not sustainable." "It is a real difference with China: them, it is solid", said Balveer Arora. And this issue does not merely to the Organization of a sporting event. The difficulties highlighted by the Commonwealth Games are nothing else that "what is normal and daily in the functioning of our Government", said the daily "Business Standard" in a relentless editorial a few days before the start of the festivities. Remains whether if the proper conduct of these will not bury any desire for critical analysis of Government after October 14.