Lasers strobed the night skies, music thundered from the speaker stacks, dancers lined up and military bands marched with customary precision and a super-sized balloon hovered in the skies even as the 19th Commonwealth Games at the Nehru Stadium in New Delhi came to a close on Thursday night.

India finished at best-ever second place in the medals table with 38 golds and overall 101 medals the mood was euphoric at the closing ceremony yesterday. Australia took the first place and England came behind India to get the third place.

The 12-day Common Wealth Games sports extravaganza held in New Delhi came to a close in style on Thursday night. More than 60,000 spectators packed the Jawahar Lal Nehru Stadium as fireworks lit the sky and the baton was handed over to Glasgow by India which will be hosting the Games in 2014.

71 nations and 6,000 athletes participated in the games which was clearly bigger than its predecessor Melbourne. Everything went off well in spite of the games being riddled with numerous controversies and delays in the run-up to the games.

The CWG federation President Mike Fennell one of the biggest critics gave a thumbs-up to the games.