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Delhi faces fury over unpaid bills after CGames

NEW DELHI — Indian organisers of the Commonwealth Games have left foreign contractors and sports bodies with millions of dollars of unpaid bills, business owners and diplomats said on Thursday.

Several hundred containers of equipment were also impounded in India after the Games, and companies say they have been unable to contact officials whose email addresses and telephone numbers were cancelled.
Firms in Australia, Britain, France and Germany are among those owed money, officials in New Delhi told AFP, while national Commonwealth Games Associations have complained of missing refunds and travel subsidies.
A legal battle is now looming with foreign companies seeking full payment for their services plus compensation for delays with specialist equipment often taking months to remove from India.
“Last time we told them (the Games accountants) to pay everything in full that is due under all agreements,” Lalit Bhanot, secretary general of the organising committee, said in New Delhi on Thursday.
“Now we will check what is the position and what is the problem if there is one.”
Ric Birch, the Australian impresario behind the opening and closing ceremonies, has instructed lawyers to launch a class action against the Delhi 2010 organisers.
“There were up to 15 other companies involved with the opening ceremony and many more companies involved with the Commonwealth Games overall,” Birch told ABC radio in Australia on Thursday.
“None of the companies have received their payments which were due under contract by the end of October.”
Birch, who has produced opening ceremonies for several Olympics, said his Commonwealth Games experience had soured his view of the host country.
“We decided that India stood for: India I’ll never do it again,” he told ABC.
Birch’s company Spectak said it was owed Aus$350,000, sound company Norwest Productions is owed about $1million and fireworks company Howard & Sons about $300,000 plus a claim of up to $900,000 in compensation.
British diplomats said that broadcasting company SIS Live was also lobbying the British High Commission to help it collect about 30 percent of unpaid fees for producing and transmitting the Games’ television coverage.
 
 

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