Is Hosting the Olympics a Wise Move for India?

 

That sounds a good deal like some of the rhetoric used in the run-up to the first Iraq war: “The price of freedom, and the moment when the Kuwaitis and the Saudis flex their muscles and demonstrate that they’re serious about getting the Iraqi leaders to quit gorging themselves on oil revenues.”

 

Thus, hall events and spectacles like the Olympic Games are expensive which have a bad record of putting a lot of pressure on the host country. Montreal for instance fell on bad times after the 1976 Olympics.

 

Paris 2024: Setting The Difficulty Bells with A Tumultuous Beginning

 

With Paris hosting the 2024 Summer Olympic Games scheduled to start on the 26th of July. Nevertheless, the City of Love has not warm welcome typical for this event. Athletes, tourists and security personnel are contributing to massive interferences to the acoustics. It has been identified that, because of the aforesaid restrictions, 46% of the inhabitants in the city are planning to flee the city during the games. Some of them have already become a cause of concern including a plan to relocate them temporarily and for this even the president Emmanuel Macron had to intervene to resolve a disagreement where it was proposed that second-hand booksellers in the Seine should be displaced for some time. Tony Estanguet, the head of the organizing committee assures that it will be worth it for the disturbances.

 

India’s Olympic Ambitions

 

It was on 13 October 2023 that PM Narendra Modi officially informed the world that India wanted to host the Olympics 2036 through a message that he delivered to the 141st IOC meeting in Mumbai. However, the Indian government must ask itself if hosting Olympics is even worth it. The Olympics are a costly affair, and it is on an average now costs $8 billion plus for Summer Olympics, as seen in the Oxford Olympics Study 2024.

 

On the financial front, host nations and cities have had to bear the horns of the responsibility by financing the holding of the Olympics.

 

Organizing mega sporting events usually has a negative impact in that they tend to cause a lot of expenditure. Due to this, Montreal accumulated a debt greater than CAD $1 billion. 500 years from the 1976 Olympics, which players took 30 years to repay. The Athens Games of 2004 are also accused to have contributed to the Greek debt problem. The high costs have made some bidder to think twice. For instance, Victoria, Australia, cut out the preparation and management of the 2026 commonwealth games due to escalating costs. This has put aspersions on Brisbane’s preparedness and readiness to host the 2032 Summer Olympics.

 

Unclear Financial Accountability

 

Undoubtedly, one of the most worrying elements is that very often there is no obvious financial transparency in the context of hosting the Olympics. As per the Oxford Olympics Study 2016 it was analyzed that for more than a third of the Olympic Games held since 1960 it was challenging to get the clear information about initial and final costs. Certain hosts have gone to great lengths, I guess, to obscure costs and overruns.

 

Efforts for Sustainable Olympics

 

The IOC has tried to increase sustainability of the games. The agenda 2020+5 focuses on the sustainable development goals and encompasses the economic components of the BIE with the existing or temporary facilities or locations other than a host city. This agenda is to be fulfilled by the Paris 2024 Games, in which 95% of all the competitions will take place in currently existing or temporary facilities. However, the total costs of delivering the games are expected to exceed $9 billion, than the earlier projection. A large part of this cost is funded by the private sector, but can such Model prevail in India?

 

Costs and Benefits on the Economy and Future Consequences

There is quite a controversy about the economic returns that are generated from Olympics. According to a study by the university of Limoges, the economical revenue that would accrue to the Paris region from the games was put at between €6. 7 billion and €11. 1 billion during 17 years of the contract’s implementation. This reason translates into a growing of approximately € 650 million per annum or barely a percent. The share of IT in France’s GDP for 2023 to be 3% of the total Gross Domestic Product. The National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies of France has said that there is ‘no consensuses on the proposition that the holding of such big events leads to enhancement of economic activity.

 

Infrastructure and Legacy

 

Thus, contrary to expectations that come with hosting the Olympics, new infrastructure such as that seen in Rio de Janeiro tends not to be used. As one would presume, for a multi-city games, India would need new infrastructure; however, as the experience with the post-2010 Commonwealth games showed, the hardware of niche, sporting character may be left to languish in obscurity.

 

Why Host the Olympics?

 

Hence, economic considerations are not the only one determining host countries’ decision to invite Olympic Games. Robert A. Baade and Victor A. Matheson provided a literature review whose conclusion were that there is eagerness by a nations’ leaders to demonstrate political and economic dominance through hosting the games. India, currently spending ₹2. It is therefore questioning whether India, which has committed Rs 4 trillion a year for subsidized food to 800 million citizens till the end of 2028, requires such extravaganza.

 

To sum it up, the Indian government needs to ponder over the pros and cons before attempting to host the 2036 Olympics. What has not been effectively reached in these regards: financial burden, unclear benefits, and the uncertain social value of infrastructure.