The Baton Relay, which was launched by Queen Elizabeth II at the Buckingham Palace in London on October 29 last year in the presence of the Indian President Pratibha Patil, will now start a 100-day national tour which would culminate in New Delhi for the Games from October 3 to 14. The baton will be taken to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar and remain there till Friday night.

The baton will then travel through most states in India, covering 20,000 km, before reaching New Delhi for the 2010 CWG to be held from Oct 3-14.

The baton travelled nearly 170,000 km through nearly 70 Commonwealth countries before arriving in the host country for the 2010 Games.

The 2010-CWG is the biggest sporting event being hosted by India after the 1982 Asian Games held in New Delhi.

Commonwealth Games tickets for modest Rs 50 to a Rs 50,000, went on sale today with sports enthusiasts having the option of booking them online or through call centres.

Book the tickets

www.tickets.cwgdelhi2010.org

Call center facility 1800-200-1294

Central Bank of India and Hero Honda stores

Ticket prices for the sporting events range from Rs 50 to Rs 1,000 while prices for the Opening and Closing Ceremony range from Rs 1,000 to Rs 50,000 and Rs 750 to Rs 50,000 respectively.

Four events will have free entry for fans — the Marathon, the Walk, Cycling Road Race and Cycling Time Trial. Almost 40 per cent of the competition venue tickets have been put at Rs 200 or below, the Organising Committee said.

“Tickets is one of the four revenue streams for the Organising Committee, the others being Broadcast Rights, Sponsorship and Merchandise. I am sure ticketing will raise the budgeted revenues for us,” Kalmadi said.

“Tickets have been reasonably priced to make it affordable for all. There will no entertainment tax on the tickets so that one can get full value of his money. We have put in place multiple sales channel to ensure wider distribution,” Kalmadi added.

Indian Rail Catering and Tour Company (IRCTC), Broad Vision Systems and TicketPro has been appointed the official ticketing agency. IRCTC will sell tickets via the Internet, call center, a network of retail outlets and at different sporting venues during the Games.

There will be around 17 lakh tickets available for sale. The ticket sales will be done in three phases. During phase-I (June 1 to July 31), spectators buying the tickets will be provided with a confirmation voucher which will be exchanged for actual tickets beginning August 1, also marking the start of phase-II.

During the second phase (August 1 to September 31), the spectators will have actual tickets against every purchase. Phase-III, which will begin just before the Games (October 1), will see venue sales outlets also added to the sales channel.

Ticket sales in international markets began in November 2009 while sales to sponsors began last month. Each ticket holder can travel free of charge by Delhi Metro trains and DTC buses to reach and return from the venue on the day of the event for which they hold a ticket.

XIX Commonwealth Games 2010 in Delhi is scheduled from 3 to 14 th October 2010. It have developed a Commonwealth Business Club of India, by  joint initiative of the Organising Committee Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi and FICCI. Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi has already asserted India’s global presence and brought to the forefront the country’s emergence as a sporting, political and economic giant.

It is estimated that the Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi would result in an overall economic impact on India over a period of 2008-2012 of approximately USD 4500 million – nearly three times that of Melbourne 2006.

The Commonwealth Games Impact Study indicates that the GDP was affected at every event in past decade. The Commonwealth Games 2002 Manchester created an impact of nearly USD 3400 million on the country’s GDP while the Commonwealth Games 2006 Melbourne created an impact of USD 1600 million on the GDP of Australia.