By Tom Degun in Glasgow

Mike_Fennell_Dec_3December 3 - Mike Fennell, the President of the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF), has backed the Indian investigation into those allegedly involved in corruption during the 2010 Commonwealth Games.


Sports company Swiss Timing has recently been charged by Indian police over alleged kickbacks after a wide-ranging probe.

Organising Committee secretary general Lalit Bhanot and director general V K Verma, the closest aides to the unpopular chairman of the event Suresh Kalmadi, have also been charged with criminal conspiracy, cheating and corruption after police said Swiss Timing had supplied equipment "at exorbitant rates of 1.07 billion rupees ($220,000) and thereby causing huge loss to the Government".

Fennell told insidethegames: "I have always maintained that allegations of corruption must be thoroughly investigated by the proper authorities and whatever is wrong must be dealt with by the relevant laws in India.

"The investigations must be done because you cannot have such serious allegations against senior figures and not investigate them thoroughly.

"They must obviously be dealt with accordingly and I fully support any investigation where serious wrongdoing could be involved."

A Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) spokesperson said "more details of corruption will emerge soon," while under-fire chairman Kalmadi, a senior member of India's ruling Congress party, has not yet been quizzed by the CBI.

Fennell is currently here in Glasgow at the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games Review which has not been attended by any representatives from Delhi.

Fennell explained: "The meeting here in Scotland has been a chance to review the Games towards the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games and is really about looking ahead, which is why we have the 2018 bid cities [Hambantota of Sri Lanka and the Gold Coast of Australia] in attendance.

"Yes, we did invite some senior office bearers from Delhi to attend but, with the big concerns they are having, they were not able to come.

"However, we have had presentations from a lot of the consultants who were in Delhi for the Games so it is not a huge loss."

John Scott, chief executive of Glasgow 2014, echoed Fennell's comments, saying: "We understand there is a lot going on in Delhi at the moment.

"They have clearly got accountabilities to deliver on and I'm sure they are being pressed hard for an enormous amount of information, so their ability to leave the country to come to Glasgow for a whole week would have been challenging.

"However, we have senior figures here who worked out in Delhi for long periods, such as Mike Hooper [the CGF chief executive] who was a resident there for a number of years.

"Therefore we are still getting the benefit of insider knowledge, which is what you would look for in a session like this."

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