Stale food irks volunteers

While the athletes are feasting on gourmet food, volunteers for the Games have been getting stale food and they’ve had enough. They have threatened to quit and expose the poor facilities on Facebook if something isn’t done soon.

While the athletes are feasting on gourmet food, volunteers for the Games have been getting stale food and they’ve had enough. They have threatened to quit and expose the poor facilities on Facebook if something isn’t done soon.

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Volunteers from the Indira Gandhi stadium reached the Organising Committee (OC) headquarters on Thursday to lodge a complaint. “We have made a video of the poor facilities and will upload it on Facebook if the situation does not improve,” one said.

“We have threatened to stop work. There are times we don’t even get food packets,” a second added while yet another volunteer said: “We complained many times.” The volunteers claimed even the new caterers hired by the OC were serving bad food.

“We’ve received some complaints and are trying to streamline things,” said OC spokesman Lalit Bhanot.

If the volunteers are facing a problem of quality, the 500 Delhi Police constables securing the practice venues have a quantity issue. “All we get at the end of the shift is one roti, 50 grams of rice, a tablespoon of dal, another tablespoon of raita (curd) and half a litre of water,” said a constable posted at St Stephen’s College.

What’s worse, the Delhi Police are billed Rs 145 for each meal.