How India Made Its Grand Prix Dream Come True

Vivek Prakash/Reuters

Red Bull Formula One driver Sebastian Vettel of Germany driving out of the pit lane during the first practice session of the Indian Grand Prix at the Buddh International Circuit in Greater Noida, on the outskirts of New Delhi, on Friday.

The Indian Grand Prix, which is running for the second year this weekend in Greater Noida, outside New Delhi, was one of the Formula One races that it had once seemed would never happen, could never happen - and then not only did it happen, but when it did it wowed the world.

Workers cleaning the track, which was dusty last year,  for the second Indian Grand Prix.

After Formula One came to China with its race outside Shanghai in 2004, there remained no market in Asia more important for the elite racing series to break into than India. With a population of 1.2 billion and a growing middle class, the powerhouse on the subcontinent was a vast and potentially lucrative market for the series and its sponsors. Moreover, India even had a small auto-racing tradition of its own.

The British had started running rally races in the country in the 1920s, and there were Indian single-seater series. But most racing had not taken place on permanent, Formula One-style racetracks, of which there were only two in India, in Chennai and in Coimbatore, and neither was even close to meeting Formula One standards.

Formula One races had begun to be televised in India regularly in the 1990s, and the Kingfisher beer and airline company, owned by the racing fan Vijay Mallya, had been sponsoring teams since the 1990s.

Mallya then went on from sponsorship into team ownership, creating the Force India team in 2008.

“It has always been my dream to bring Formula One to India,” Mallya said when introducing the new team's car that year. “The government of Delhi I think really wants Formula One in India and I am optimistic that maybe we will be able to host our first race in 2009.”

There had been Indian drivers in the series. Narain Karthikeyan raced with the Jordan team in 2005 and was a test driver at the Williams team for a couple of seasons after that. This year he is driving for the HRT team. Karun Chandhok started racing in the series at the new Hispania team in 2010 and also drove for Lotus in 2011.

Indeed, all that was missing was an Indian Grand Prix. Mallya and Chandhok's father, Vicky, had been pushing for one for years, via the Indian auto-racing organization.

But in the modern version of Formula One that was expanding around the world, virtually all of the new races had come about thanks to funding by local governments. In India, where poverty levels and need for development are a priority despite the booming economy, government support of a car race was not a priority, although the government did show some interest.

The tale of trying to hold the Grand Prix is indeed a long and convoluted one. As early as 1997, there had been talk of holding a race in Calcutta. But by 2003, the idea shifted to holding it near Bangalore airport. At the same time, the chief minister of the southeastern state of Andhra Pradesh had set aside land to build the circuit near the airport at Hyderabad, and then a seven-year agreement was signed to hold the race elsewhere outside Hyderabad, starting in 2007.

Then, early in 2004, Mumbai began to show interest, and it was decided that the race would take place either there or in Hyderabad. By the end of that year, however, the deal fell through as the government changed its mind about spending money on racing.

By 2007, five sites around the country were being considered. In the end, Formula One signed a deal for the race with the Indian Olympic Association. It was decided to build the circuit in Greater Noida, outside New Delhi, with funding entirely from the private sector.

Even then, it looked as if the race would never really happen. The Grand Prix was announced for 2009, then 2010, and finally 2011.

Given this tumultuous history, but also because of the widely criticized organization of the Commonwealth Games staged in New Delhi in 2010, skeptics around the world wondered if India was capable of hosting an international sporting event of such magnitude.

Then, racing against time and employing thousands of workers - many of whom lived in tents at the circuit site - the Indians managed to build one of the world's great sporting stadiums, the Buddh International Circuit, with a gargantuan, curved awning overhanging the 13,000 seats in the grandstand of the main straight and a world-class pit and paddock area. The organizers had fulfilled their commitment to Formula One to perfection.

A version of this article appeared in print on October 27, 2012, in The International Herald Tribune.