Delhi right to boast that it put on a Games to remember

It started with a spectacular display of ancient Indian martial arts and finished with fireworks lighting up the night sky high above this extraordinary city of over one billion people. Somehow, Delhi had done it.

Those in the full-to-capacity Jawaharlal Stadium last night witnessed what they already knew: the Indians certainly know how to put on a party. They can also proudly boast that they have just about learned how to put on a Commonwealth Games.

Plenty said it would never happen. The countdown was plagued by security concerns and shoddy workmanship. Killer mosquitoes and crazed terrorists buzzed in wait. There were cries of 'Bring Them Home!' before they had even arrived.

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The Games teetered into being with all the momentum of a cycle rickshaw with a flat front tyre. Some athletes were absent. The venues were empty. The scales were faulty. The pool was cloudy. The track was bumpy.

Out in the heat of this great sprawling city, soldiers toted guns on every street corner. Those athletes who did turn up stuck to their village like the paint that was still drying on its walls. Dignitaries lounged behind checkpoints and double-locked hotel gates.

At the helm of it all stood an organising committee chairman who seemed oblivious to the mounting chaos which his Games were threatening to become: booed to the hilt at the closing ceremony, he was less Incredible India, more Carry On Kalmadi.

And yet out of the farce of those first few days, when weightlifting ceilings were collapsing and monkeys were being employed as security guards, grew a vibrant and generally competent competition. The locals began filling the venues and roaring on not only their favourites but those of other countries.

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The competition may not always have been world-class, measured in Usain Bolt moments of world record shavings by hundredths of seconds. But it was competitive nonetheless, and it meant as much to those who won medals and witnessed them as victories and world record feats ever did to the battery of Olympian stars who refused to give the Delhi Games the benefit of the doubt.

By last night it needed to make no further claims to redemption. It had been granted by those athletes, by those who watched them, by the ever-gracious army of volunteers and to an extent by those who had come to report on them from across the world.

Outside the locked gates and security lines, rickshaw drivers took an interest or watched the nearest TV. On the track, in the stands and in the sweat and grime of everyday Delhi, they reclaimed their Games.

In doing so, Delhi preserved the spirit of Commonwealth competition in the face of a mounting army of critics, many with vested interests, who have claimed it holds no place in such a global and aggressive modern sporting world.

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Delhi never had any designs on boasting any Bolts or Phelps's. It was about allowing new stars of the future to emerge. Try telling any of them their medals are tarnished because others would not venture out of their comfort zones.