Thaindian News

By Anjali Ojha
(Attn Editors: This is the ninth of the 100-day countdown series for the 19th Commonwealth Games in New Delhi. The piece is about how the Games have brought out the spirit of volunteering like never before.)

New Delhi, July 8 (IANS) D for Diversity, E for Enterprising, L for Legacy, H for History and I for Incredible India-this is what Delhi stands for in the training manual for over 22,000 volunteers at the Commonwealth Games 2010.

Come October, and Delhi will be dotted with a uniformed, well-behaved and informative army of men and women, ready to show the world the face of Indian hospitality.

The volunteers, who include people from all walks of life and all age groups, promise to leave a new legacy with the Games - that of volunteering in India.

“Volunteering as a concept was more or less unknown to India. It is for the first time that so many people are being trained for an event,” said Devya Patney, the head of the Games organising committee looking after the training of volunteers.

The Games promise change, not just in infrastructure but also in attitudes.

The Oct 3-14 extravaganza promises to paint India in good light and leave a legacy on Indian hospitality for generations to come, Patney said.

“Commonwealth Games 2010 will leave behind a long lasting legacy not only in the form of infrastructure and sports venues but also in the way we develop the skill of our human resources,” Pandey told IANS.

The three-tier training programme for these volunteers focuses on basic etiquettes to venue specific and safety training.

“There are different phases towards reaching the end that will label them successful volunteers. The first is general training, which is for soft skills. The second level will be specific to their roles while the third phase will be undertaken just before the Games start,” Patney said.

A tailor-made programme to keep the enthusiasm of volunteers on a high includes catchy lines like ‘U for United’, ‘N for Namaste’, and a host of similar punchlines to remind them of their roles.

The training looks at providing general information about etiquette, how to communicate with guests and what to convey.

‘How may I help you’, ‘please tell me what is wrong’, ‘I see what you mean’, ‘let’s resolve it together’, these are some of the lines from the manual handed over to the volunteers.

“The training has been outsourced to Amity University; there are 130 batches for the general training which will be completed by the first week of August. Simultaneously, the second phase of role specific training will also start from the second week of July,” she said.

Though the initial plans were to take on 30,000 volunteers, the numbers were reduced to 22,000 as per requirements.

“Numbers are not the primary concern, we have sufficient volunteers and following training, the Games are definitely going to show the world that India believes in treating ‘guests as gods’,” a member of the volunteer training committee said.

(Anjali Ojha can be contacted at anjali.o@ians.in )