Games Village mess: Sheila blames DDA, builders

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on Monday squarely blamed the Delhi Development Authority and private developer Emaar MGF for the poor condition of the Games Village.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on Monday squarely blamed the Delhi Development Authority and private developer Emaar MGF for the poor condition of the Games Village.

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The Village was initially described as filthy and uninhabitable by foreign delegates, greatly embarrassing the host country. It was built by Emaar MGF on the public private partnership model, with the land handed to them by the DDA.

A mad scramble to bring the apartments up to scratch is currently on.

Dikshit acknowledged there was seepage in many of the buildings in the Village, which she said the DDA and the builder should have rectified before handing the flats over.

“We inherited it (the Village) in a very difficult situation. But it is improving almost by the hour. We are working very hard,” Dikshit said.

“Everything will be alright. Of course there are some seepages which the builder and the DDA should have looked at earlier,” the chief minister said.

The prime minister's office had last week directed the Delhi government to take over the complex from the DDA and fix the mess.

Neither the DDA nor Emaar-MGF responded to Dikshit's comments. Dikshit refused to set any deadline for the clean up. “It all depends how quickly the water is removed and how quickly the lifts start working. We are cleaning up the rooms and the public areas. We are racing against time but we will perform,” she said.

Dikshit also took exception to Commonwealth Games CEO Mike Hooper's reported comments on Delhi's teeming population calling it a 'hazard'. “It is really a very unkind and undiplomatic remark that has been made,” Dikshit said.