05 August,2010 03:15 PM IST | | IANS
Declaring that "India will get there", India's Sports Minister M S Gill told parliament on Thursday that the stadia and other infrastructure will be ready much before the Commonwealth Games (CWG) begins October 3.
"Have faith in India. India will get there," Gill told opposition members led by Prakash Javdekar of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Brinda Karat of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) who raised the issue of delays and alleged corrupt deals related to the CWG in the Rajya Sabha, parliament's upper house.
Former sports minister Mani Shankar Aiyar demanded an apex body at the earliest to oversee the CWG work. He said the Group of Ministers (GOM) on the CWG had been a "blatant failure".
Regarding alleged corruption in CWG, Gill said his ministry had written to various ministries, including the external affairs and finance ministries, to take action on persons found guilty of misappropriating funds.
Javdekar said the government should make it clear whether the games would be conducted properly.
Karat said the CWG had turned into a "game of corruption" and it was not "justifiable to give license to corruption for two more months in the name of conducting the CWG".
The Games will be held October 3-14. It will have participation from 71 countries and territories that are members of the Commonealth of Nations that were at one time part of the British Empire.
