CWG OC to take over stadia by Aug end

The Organising Committee said the process of formally taking over the CWG venues has started and all the stadiums will be under their control by August 30.

OC secretary general Lalit Bhanot said their entire staff of around 700 people has shifted to the stadiums and formal take over of the venues will begin from Tuesday.

"Our venue operation teams have already moved to the stadium and started assessment. They are preparing inventory along with service manager of the venue owners. This exercise will continue for a few more days," Bhanot said.

"After getting the reports, we will start taking over stadiums formally. May be tomorrow we will take over Talkatora stadium and other smaller venues while bigger stadiums may take two more days," he said.

"The overlay work has already started since our teams are there for the last 15 days. We will get most of the stadiums by August 15 and remaining by August 30," he added.

Bhanot said the OC will ask the venue owners to provide all the necessary clearances along with the stadiums.

"All the mandatory clearances like safety of the building, fire certificate, power certificate will be provided to us by the venue owners," he said.

Bhanot, who is also the spokesperson of OC, insisted there was no delay in taking over of the stadiums and the Games would not be affected.

"There is no delay. We are ready to host Games as far as technical conduct of the Games is concerned. Our teams had shifted their in the middle of July and started working. Now entire thing is in the hands of OC," he said.

Commonwealth Games OC takes over Talkatora stadium

Commonwealth Games Organizing Committee took over the first completed venue on Friday — the Talkatora indoor boxing stadium. With construction over, the Organising Committee will now focus on the remaining technical work at the venue.

Suresh Kalmadi, chairman of the CWG OC, said that in the coming week, the OC would be taking over more venues, a process that would continue for another month. "All stadiums are ready and some small works are left at the Talkatora and Jawahar Lal Nehru stadia" he said.

Kalmadi added that all training areas were also complete but most individual sports committees had informed them that they would not need to use the facility for more than a couple of weeks. "It is only partially true that the training arenas were delayed where athletes could practise but we will make up for lost time," he said.

The Talkatora stadium is one of the city's greenest buildings, having been constructed with recycled building material, fly ash and heat reflective glass.
The boxing event is scheduled from October 5 to 13.

The stadium, with a capacity of 3,035, has been built at a cost of Rs 150 crore. It also boasts of a parking space for 500 cars. With the OC taking over, about 80 of its members and about 500 volunteers would be stationed here eventually.

The facility centre at the venue is equipped with a rainwater harvesting system and a dual knob flushing system. Around 200 CCTVs will secure the venue. During the Games, each floor of the centre would be used for different purposes. The ground floor for instance will have athlete cubicles, medical office warm-up area and athlete lounge. The first floor will have a doping-control office, federation office, technical official lounge, committee room, meeting room and changing rooms, among other facilities.

5th Commonwealth Boxing Championships start in Delhi

The Indian Boxing Federation (IBF) today inaugurated the 5th Commonwealth Boxing Championship 2010 at a gala opening ceremony held at the Talkatora Stadium.

The 5th Commonwealth Boxing Championship (CBC) was officially opened by the Union minister of youth affairs and sports, MS Gill.

The opening ceremony had bag pipers leading the posse as various participating teams paraded inside the stadium. Singer Mansi Scott gave a scintillating performance and enthralled the audience.

The 5th CBC will witness over 100 boxers from 14 countries in over 100 bouts from 12th -17th March, 2010 at Talkatora Stadium fighting for this prestigious title. Many major commonwealth boxing nations including India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, England, Wales, Scotland, New Zealand, Samoa, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Tanzania, Mauritius, Botswana, and the Bahamas will participate. The boxers are segregated in 10 following weight categories namely 49 kgs, 52 kgs, 56 kgs, 60 kgs, 64 kgs, 69 kgs, 75kgs, 81 kgs, 91 kgs, + 91 kgs.

Indian boxing heroes such as Vijender Singh, Akhil Kumar, Dinesh Kumar, Suranjay Singh etc will be contending for India in their respective weight categories and will be seen in action in front of the home crowd. And with our current boxing talents IBF expects to win more medals this year.

The Opening Ceremony as well as all the days of the CBC will have various entertainment elements to keep the audiences engaged and entertained. The CBC is open for general public viewing and tickets are nominally charged at Rs 100 per day.

Mr. Abhay Singh Chautala, president, Indian Boxing Federation said, “Commonwealth Boxing Championship is a very prestigious event to be held first time in our country. We are extremely confident that our new crop of boxers will shine in this championship by winning at least 4 out of 10 gold medals”

IBF secretary general, Col PK Muralidharan Raja said, "We as a federation promise to make this an event to remember and hope that the participating countries will cherish this experience."

Commonwealth Boxing championships in March

The 5th Commonwealth Boxing Championships will be held at Talkatora Stadium, New Delhi from March 10-18, 2010, this was announced by the Indian Boxing Federations on Thursday.

Announcing this IBF secretary general, Col PK Muralidharan Raja said, barring Australia who have regretted their participation all other major commonwealth boxing nations have confirmed their willingness to participate in the commonwealth boxing championships at Delhi

The participants for the commonwealth championships in March 2010 are England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, South Africa, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Mauritius, Kenya, Samoa, Singapore, Canada (not yet confirmed) and India.

India’s performance in the last Commonwealth Games at Melbourne in 2006 were superlative as Akhil Kumar (54kgs) won gold medal, Vijender Singh (69kgs) & Harpreet Singh (91kgs) won silver medals while Jitender Kumar (51kgs) & Varghese Johnson (+91kgs) won bronze medals.

Since then, valiant efforts by world champion MC Mary Kom, Olympic & World championship bronze medalist Vijender singh, Asian gold medalist & Presidents Cup best boxer Suranjoy Singh, World Youth Championship gold medalist Nanao Singh and other medalists at various international competitions have ensured that India is being considered as an elite boxing nation in the boxing circles, added Col Raja

On this occasion the IBF thanked Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports, organizing committee of Commonwealth Games and Sports Authority of India to their support for the successful conduct of the commonwealth boxing championships here.

IBF president Abhay Singh Chautala also thanked media saying, "It has been purely due to your whole hearted support and involvement that our boxers have been motivated to attain peak performances at international competitions as well as have become household names in many parts of the country".

Col Raja said that IBF is on the lookout for an exclusive marketing agent for promotion of boxing in India with whom a contract will be signed for the period Feb 2010 – Dec 2014 for which tender documents are being issued to the prospective bidders on Jan 9, 2010. A special feature of this tender is that a minimum guarantee is being sought from the bidder by the federation and also profit sharing on a percentage to be worked out with them, he elaborated.

IBF hoped to raise sufficient funds for the promotion of boxing and produce more boxers like Vijender, Mary Kom, Akhil Kumar and Suranjoy in India, he said.

The International Boxing Association (AIBA) has nominated the following official for the commonwealth championships.