SUCCESS has many fathers and failures none, goes the cliched adage. But it probably has no better parallel than Indian sport. As Dingko Singh fought his way in and outside the ring, everybody was patting themselves on the back with a shameless "I-had-predicted-his-victory" line, when just a couple of weeks ago, a ministry official, while dropping him from the squad, had said, "if he goes, he will be a national disgrace".

When Geet Sethi made a huge noise about not getting the kit due to him—the snooker champ can afford to buy one but he wanted a kit with India colours—an official went up to him and said "he" would get his kit, if he kept quiet and not let the others know. Geet Sethi is too polished to be uncivil, but in this case if he did not slap the official, it is because he has tremendous restraint.

"But why do you need a track suit? Don't billiards and snooker players compete in suits and tuxedos?" asked one official. Sethi shot back: "I want to wear India colours, because I am representing the country."

As for the kabaddi boys, they did not know which of the 'factions' would get the nod, till a few days before games. That India can field a squad—with members from both warring factions—and still think of medals, a gold at that, is a tribute to players, not officials.

Now for Dingko Singh. Like all great champions, he has grace, a word unfamiliar in Indian sports officialdom. "Let's forget all what happened before I came here and be proud of the gold medal," he said, after his tremendous win. En route to becoming India's first boxing winner in 16 years, he beat a World Cup silver medallist, Sontaya Wongprates, a local hero, and Goodwill champ and World No 2, Timur Tulya-kov of Uzbekistan.

Just 20 years old, Dingko won the prestigious King's Cup at the same venue last year and was adjudged "Best Boxer" at the National Championships for the last two years. Yet, the ministry scrapped his name from the list submitted by selectors. "I have achieved one half of my dream...," says the euphoric Dingko, who lost his father so early that he has no memories of him. Hailing from a poor family in Manipur, the youngster, who works in the Services, was raised in poverty, and has "hunger in his belly"—a factor as crucial as skill in boxing.

Jyotirmoyee Sikdar, who runs with ill-fit-ting spikes because they are lucky for her, had wanted only a medal from the Asian Games after twice—in the 800 m and the 1,500 m—finishing fourth in the '94 games. But she got two, and gold. "I knew I would get a medal, but gold! I never even imagined that," she says, with a smile that showed her pearly teeth well enough to fetch her an immediate contract with a toothpaste manufacturer.

The biggest star since P.T. Usha, who ironically faded into the background with age and injuries catching up with the sprinter queen finally, Jyoti is dreaming big. "If I can beat the Chinese, maybe I can think of the Olympics," says she. And the officials nod in attendance, as if they understand that dream, borne out of sweat and blood.

With the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) compromising on its initial decision of sending only medal hopes, the first week was unmitigated disaster. And the list of excuses, like the list of failures, seemed never-ending. "We have to look after our politics, too," admits a senior IOA official, in a rare moment of candour, when queried about the need of sending "passengers" like the volleyball squad.

It was, therefore, ironical that when India won its first gold medal—Sikdar's 1,500 m sprint—the organisers bungled to the extent that they played the national anthem thrice. "Maybe they don't expect to hear it again in these games, so they are playing it over and over again," quipped a colleague. Fortunately, there were more gold medals from Sikdar (800 m), Dingko, Sethi....

Thanks to them, India will come back from the Bangkok Asian Games with its best ever medal tally from a multi-event gathering in recent times, and the follies and foibles of Indian officialdom, which cannot help playing favourites, are likely to be glossed over. The reality is many of these parasitical officials will continue to do what they love doing, feed off the glory of the sportspersons.

And finally, we know how many members are there in the Indian contingent—240. Curiously, at no point was the IOA able to give the precise number it had brought along, whether "at government expense" or "at no cost to government". In the first week, the officials were busy attending meetings. The chef-de-mission, G.S. Mander, while making token visits to venues, was busy lobbying to get elected to the Asian Wrestling Association, while K.P.S. Gill, president, Indian Hockey Federation, was trounced in his attempt to become president of the Asian Hockey Federation. "It seems the voting members were aware of what's happening to Indian hockey, so they didn't want the same to happen to Asian hockey," joked one of the members of our hockey squad.

India's decent-looking medal haul would have been more meaningful if the IOA, flushed with money from gullible sponsors, had not increased the numbers, either due to pressure from loyalists or from constituent federations. Even the uninitiated could have seen that India had little chance in, say, women's football. The men's football team was sent for all the wrong reasons. Not cleared till the last moment, it came mainly because of the clout the president of the All India Football Federation, P.R. Das Munshi, wields.

Some of the swimmers clocked their life's best—which wasn't enough to make the Asia grade—but the sight of anchor Nisha Millet waiting on the blocks for the third swimmer to touch down before she plunged into the water will stay in the mind for a long time. Because by that time many of the other teams were midway through the last leg of the 4 x 200m freestyle relay. Archery, judo, wrest-ling...the stories were the same.

That will of course not deter officials from basking in the glory of the athletes' successes and plan more trips, where they may not win medals but can certainly look forward to a lot of shopping. Check the baggage at the airport when they return.

(The writer is Sports Editor, 'The Indian Express')