Dylan Cleaver: Athletes missing out on amazing country

The flash and colour of the Commonwealth Games opening ceremony is all many of the athletes will experience of the India that lies beyond the Games village walls. Photo / AP

India is the home of the cliche.

Within minutes of stepping off the plane, or boat as the case once was, over-enthusiastic letter writers, journalists and commentators trip over themselves in the race to declare the place a "study in contrasts", as if the only interesting thing about the country is its opulence and destitution.

Long-time BBC India correspondent Mark Tully, who was based in Delhi, has written several books on the country. The title of one, No Full Stops in India, perhaps provides the most apt description of the place.

With such vast geography and population, with such diverse religion and regional cultures, it is impossible to string a sentence together and get to the essence of India. One thing is certain, however, these Commonwealth Games will be like none other before. You could argue they already are.

With accusations of graft, shoddy workmanship, filth and missed deadlines, the lead-up to the Games has been blanketed in controversy like never before. India's mass media market has salivated over every lurid detail of the incompetence of the Delhi Organising Committee, while foreign media have planted a bullseye on the foreheads of the bigwigs at the Commonwealth Games Federation.

The unfortunate thing is that Delhi itself has become a byword for shambles. The Indian capital doesn't deserve that and Delhi-ites don't deserve to be tarred because of the incompetence or corruption of a few.

Already the city has suffered from the fear that foreigners will either be soft targets for terrorists, or plump targets for dengue fever-carrying mosquitoes. Tickets have been harder to shift than a stubborn elephant and the projected bonanza for hoteliers has failed to materialise.

Add to that the fact that several of the big Commonwealth delegations are putting the teams into lockdown and you'll have a city of chagrined retailers and a Games village full of inhabitants who are no wiser to the wonders of India than when they arrived.

It's a genuine shame. Delhi offers some of the world's great sightseeing, from the Red Fort to Humayun's Tomb to, admittedly 200km away, the incomparable Taj Mahal in Agra. The city's markets are enthralling and occasionally intimidating, but again tourists have been warned away from such spots as the spectre of extremists looms.

So for those that stay within the "bubble" the Games could be just about anywhere, while viewers at home will probably learn more about India than the athletes. What a study in contrast.