2 hours@34th National Games, Ranchi

Ever since Ranchi was selected as the venue for the national games - I was super excited to witness the spectacle called National Games to be held in Ranchi(my home city). I cherished the thought that  soon I will witness live sports . Since a month I was really thrilled to see how my city of falls was getting ready for the show- the roads were reconstructed, the city  walls painted with shades of yellow, pink and blue, with anti-encroachment drives (suddenly the city’s  streets seemed so well maintained and traffic blues were a thing of the past ), the whole city was suddenly rising to meet the challenges thrown open to her. I was really excited to witness the sea change in administrative efficiency with law and order in place and each and every citizen cooperating with the administration in entirety . Ever since the opening of the national games (after  some glitches of around 4yrs) , I was( to be honest)  bewildered by the scintillating opening ceremony  on 12th February,2011. The land of Birsa Munda was all prepared to host players and guests from 35 states and UT’s of India. The games gave an opportunity to the youngest state of the Indian Republic to showcase its natural beauty and wealth to the rest of the country. I remember some of the players (who had accompanied us on our flight from Delhi on the eve of the games) were almost spellbound on reaching Ranchi-the pleasant weather coupled with greenery all around and the budding beauty of an emerging city was at full display. The Games no doubt was giving an opportunity to the newest capital city to rediscover and develop its potentialities. The large number of  Hotels (including Raddison ) , the huge Multiplex complexes , wide street roads, big by –road advertisement hoadings-everything and everyone seemed eager to capitalize on the opportunity thrown open by the hoisting of the games. The sports tourism led to multiplier benefits for the nascent emerging economy of Jharkhand. The games gave a bird eye view  to the rest of the country to know more and more about their eastern state of Jharkhand (its tribal culture in full bloom with the emerging cosmopolitan environment ).

In this hindsight, I was literally going crazy for witnessing the live events at the Khelgaon at Hotwar, Ranchi. I got an opportunity to live this dream of mine today(22nd Feb,2011) . On my way to Khelgaon I was  taken aback on seeing the efficiency of the traffic police, the traffic lights at several places and above all several men and women were busy brooming the city's  busy streets at around 3:30pm in the evening. On reaching the Khelgaon, I was flabber gasted on seeing tens of thousands of men and women(not only young boys and girls, but also elderly people in 60’s and 70’s as well as new born babies). I was asked by my dad to feel comfortable and enjoy the crowd(at this juncture I would admit that my short stint at London has made me a bit averse to extremely crowdy places).On reaching the entrance , we were asked to stand in long unending ques  for entering the venue. Once we were inside- I became a part of mob mentality-as there were no sign posts anywhere so we (me and my dad) followed the crowd wherever majority were heading (this action of ours made me realize why we in India are so much averse to individual decision ). Passing through several metal detectors, we were finally in front of huge stadiums –which by any magnitude were simply AMAZING!. Passing through them , I was really feeling  proud as a Ranchiite. The huge air filled chhauas(the Mascot of national games)  with thousands of visitors –all super excited and extremely relaxed – drifted me  to another world of khelgaon. We then tried to enquire from a couple of volunteers about the schedule of the games-but alas to no avail! We then decided to go through the different stadiums ourselves and find out the games being played. On entering the Aquatic stadium …..(my rare sportswomen avatar reached its highest adrenalin level ) …I was really excited to witness the sport which I cherish . I had all reason to be excited - since there was a massive que at the entry of the stadium . But alas all the enthusiasm was petered out as soon as I  reached inside after alighting arnd 50-60 steep stairs as people there were simply thronging to witness the interiors and not the game! Coming out, we decided to check out other stadiums as well .Nevertheless, we were not lucky enough to witness any sport  but only  a bit of lawn tennis. While walking through the huge Khelgaon – I discovered several facets of human life. There were huge population which was  jampacking the sports stadiums and around. They were sooooo happy-eating ice creams and chips, enjoying the sun and water fountain , the lush green grasses and flowers- everything seemed so perfect for a picnic spot. My attention was drawn to a huge crowd assembled near an ampi theatre. We thought  the huge crowd must be cheering for some sport event but again it was a disappointment as these people were instead cheering the cultural troop. In spite of all the disappointments (on the sports front)…I loved to be a part of aam admi- and understand the beauty of life. The huge crowd also had a fraction of populace who during their normal course of life are busy putting financial needs in order to meet day to day needs. For this group of populace-spending some time away from the daily chores – helped them to rejuvenate and get back to work with increased efficiency-(sorry for the CORREATION ANAYSIS of mine!).The thousands also included few hundreds of elderly people who had enthusiasm (in fact more of it) than the youngsters to witness the sports world( I was tired of walking through the massive campus and took short breaks of icecreams Vs. an elderly lady who entered the Khelgaon with us but was more active and agile than me in screening different stadiums!). I saw a side of Ranchi (which I knew and appreciated) but witnessed today in entirety and that was – The Ranchi populace follow one ideal- Work hard but party harder.

What  however disappointed me a bit- was  Economics@Khelgaon. These were-firstly , the government or the organizing committee could have charged a minimal user charge per footfall.This could have helped in maintaining the stadiums (say post games ) or in meeting other emergent needs of the Khelgaon. I do know that this is a PUBLIC GOOD and hence kind of COMMONS. I just wished the impementation of what Elinor Ostrom (Noble prize winner in Economics 2010) stressed! Secondly- There was a feeling of almost spurious correlation between the footfalls at the Khelgaon and the overall sports environment(though I didn’t calculated them in strict statistic terms+plus these variables were objective vs. subjective!).

While coming out of the stadiums, I was really thrilled (yes even though I was unlucky to witness any event in entirety) to witness my city and state has organized such a huge event successfully- the scintillating stadiums, the lakhs of footfalls buzzed with sportsmen daunting their state’s T-shirts and phrases by young school girls like –“Ranchi has proved it can put together an event of such stature”  - almost did the icing for my rendezvous@34th National Games.