Thaindian News

New Delhi, July 26 (IANS) After several missed deadlines, the remodelled, 60,000 capacity Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, which will host the opening and closing ceremony of the Oct 3-14 Commonwealth Games, is ready to be formally inaugurated Tuesday.
The venue, originally built for the 1982 Asian Games, will host the showpiece athletics, weightlifting and lawn ball disciplines.

The stadium has been refurbished at a cost of whopping Rs.9.6 billion (approximately $200 million) with international consultants from six countries - Germany, Switzerland, UK, US, Mexico and Australia - putting their heads together to construct the state-of-the-art facility.

The deadline for completion of the venue has been changed several times since the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) began the construction work two years and seven months back. When Sports Minister M.S.Gill and Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit inaugurate the venue, it will be the last of the 11 games venues to be completed.

There are three independent structures of main stadium building - lower tier, main building and supporting structure for membrane roof.

The earthquake resistant building has a two tier seating arrangement in its 60,000 capacity.

The training area will have nine sprint synthetic tracks and warm-up areas for throwing and the final warm-up synthetic track is inside the main stadium.

Among the important features of the stadium are high definition television transmission, state of art sports lighting and a specially designed underground tunnel for the opening and closing ceremonies.

The venue is also home to National Dope Test Laboratory, SAI headquarter and hostel.

But the most innovative feature of the stadium is the membrane cable roof which alone cost Rs 100 crore ($20 million).

The membrane roof made of coated glass fibre is the largest in Asia. It has around 443 tonnes of pre-stretched cable with a length of 2,200 km.

The roof was built without any perpendicular support from inside the stadium. It has been built with new support extending up to 71 metres into the stands.

The roof system consists of supporting steel structure consisting of highly sophisticated steel fabrication and erection works amounting to more than 8,500 tonnes of steel works.

The whole geometry of the roof was controlled using a global computerised model while parts of the roof structure has been sourced from the US, Switzerland, Germany and UK.