Visitors toIndia in current times are unlikely to miss a pervasive new mood of aggressive self-assertion among the people who matter，a certain supreme complacence that “we” have arrived on the world stage and cannot any longer be denied a merited place at the high table in global councils. Suggestions that the celebration might be premature，are brusquely dismissed. Observations that a country with quite widespread evidence of human deprivation and numerous social fractures could not afford complacence on this scale are dismissed as voices from the past，born in minds still shackled by outmoded habits of thought.

Civil society groups in general have remained critical of this aggressive new mood. But little heed was paid to these dissenting voices within.India is now nearing the end of what can only be called a grand coming out party. After much heartburn in the run-up，the final accounts tally from the 19^thCommonwealth Games hosted in the national capital city of Delhi，seems to indicate a small positive balance in terms of national prestige. The economic impact though is another matter since there is yet no indication that the enormous public investments that went into hosting the games will engender any of the expected positive spinoffs in terms of private sector gains. The human and social cost at which the CWG was brought to India still remains to be tallied. Recent action under the RTI law has revealed that the government both in Delhi and at the Union level，diverted funds meant for social welfare spending of benefit for the disadvantaged，to preparing facilities for the CWG.^[1]International media coverage meanwhile，reports that India has forgotten its poor and disadvantaged in a headlong rush towards global power status.^[2]

Just a month ahead of the CWG，the Indian administration wasriven by a blame-game over the evident mess that has been made of the preparations. Allegations of serious malfeasance flew thick and fast. The clear and present danger was seemingly averted，that the debutante ball marking India’s emergence on the world stage，would be transformed into a testament of overblown ambitions failing the encounter with harsh realities. But many hard questions still remain unanswered.

Sukumar Muralidharan

October 13，2010