The Badminton World Federation has given its seal of approval to the extensively renovated Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi, ensuring the venue is now fully prepared to host the upcoming World Championships after addressing significant hygiene and facility concerns.
Key Points
- BWF expresses satisfaction with extensive renovations at Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium for World Championships.
- Improvements address previous criticisms from India Open, including hygiene, unclean toilets, and pest issues.
- Renovations include deep cleaning, seat replacement, sealing work, roof waterproofing, and anti-pest gel application.
- Efforts also made to remove stray animals and improve tournament lighting with international consultants.
- BWF prioritises a problem-free competition, with cleaning continuing until the August 17 tournament start.
Major Renovations Address Past Criticisms
BWF Events Director (Tournament Operations) Selvaamresh Supramaniam said the world body had conducted multiple inspections over the last seven months and found significant improvements."We visited the stadium in January, February, April, June and then in the last couple of days. A lot of work has been done," Supramaniam said."Renovations to all the toilets, there's been a lot of deep cleaning done, damaged seats have been replaced, a lot of sealing, wiring work has been done, broken ceilings have been replaced and waterproofing was done on the roof."Pest Control And Animal Management Efforts
He said an anti-pest gel has been applied on the roof beams to prevent birds from perching inside the arena."They've finished putting gel on the roof. This gel prevents birds from sitting or perching on the beams, similar to what you'll find near airports."Supramaniam said the venue was in far better shape than it was during the India Open, though cleaning would continue until the tournament begins on August 17."We are happy, but we still need to keep checking for the next few days on the cleaning that's being done. Understandably, there'll be a lot of workmen going in and out. And with rain, it is bound to get dirty. We just need to keep doing the cleaning."Addressing concerns over stray animals and birds at the venue, he said the situation had improved considerably."The last three days that I've been there, I've not seen any pigeons. I don't know whether that's because there are a lot of people or the gel is actually doing its job. I've not seen any monkeys as well."He added that the Sports Authority of India (SAI) had also taken steps to remove stray dogs from the complex."From what I heard, they rounded up almost 60-odd dogs and they were sent away. There are still some, but they are confident they'll be able to round them up as well."
