Sharad Yadav directly protests against India hosting the Commonwealth Games. Reports Rediff:

Addressing a press conference in New Delhi, Yadav said participation in the Games is wasteful expenditure and a country like India can ill-afford to spend such a huge amount of money for a few medals. “I understand that the Indian Olympic Committee, headed by Suresh Kalmadi, spent Rs 23 crore on an eleven-minute song and drama sequence, in which several film actors took part, at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games…

“What is the big deal in hosting games like the Commonwealth Games in India? What do we gain, barring a few medals and some IOA officials having a good time? I believe that the huge amount of money that would be spent on hosting the Games could have been used for giving grants to Delhi University and other academic institutions of excellence. We could have created more IITs and IIMs with that fund.

So essentially, Yadav raises two points:

1) Public money should not be wasted.

2) Public money should be used in activities for development of the nation.

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Manmohan Singh has said that India will bid for the Asian Games 2014 and Olympics 2016 reports New Kerala. Can we build infrastructure to host an Asian Games so soon? We have the Commonwealth Games in 2011 and so infrastructure would be boosted any way. So Asian Games 2014 is possible if India pursue it seriously.

Olympics in 2016? Forget the infrastructure for a minute. Lobbying and a lot of effort is also required to host the games apart from initial financial expenditure for promoting an Olympic city. Even then cities lose out. Also the competition is immense and India entering fray right now for 2016 would already find a few counries ahead of it. Maybe it can be a bidder in name (which would again require serious financial expenditure). India can go for hosting an Olympic in the future but not as early as 2016.

Half the contingent of Sierra Leone has disappeared (ran away) from the Commonwealth Athletes Village in Melbourne. Reports Reuters:

Police and Australian immigration officials have been searching for 11 athletes from the war-ravaged African country who have gone missing from the village.

This is not a new phenomena as 20 athletes went missing after the Manchester Commonwealth games in 2002. Of course the war plagued athletes will find this as a window for better life. A risk much less compared to living in the war ravaged country. Sport isn’t as important when the problems are much larger. The Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) isn’t going to rule out Sierra Leone for future games. Political dimplomacy evident in sport and sport again proving that it is life magnified.

India is proving difficult to handle with the doping scandal. The answer CGF President Mike Fennell gave explaining the doping occurences is amusing though:

It’s a very large country, over a billion people, and perhaps there will be people who are perhaps not as knowledgeable about the drug situation and the doping situation, and there will be instances.

The closing ceremony of the games is to be held today with bollywood stars staging a performance. Also, Javed Akhtar will present a song for the Delhi Games. I haven’t witnessed an international sporting event in India bar the Cricket World Cup in 1996. So come Delhi 2010, it will be nice.

Update: A few of the athletes have spoken out. They say that they fear genital mutation and death if they go back.