Hyderabad, Aug 17 - The successful and smooth conduct of the World Badminton Championships despite the initial security and swine flu scares has come as yet another feather in the cap of the Andhra Pradesh Police, which ensured an incident-free event.

The seven-day event, which concluded Sunday at the Gachibowli indoor stadium, proved that the police can provide best of the security and the organisers can ensure world-class arrangements for events of this nature.

This was the first time India hosted the World Badminton Championships and the way the event was conducted despite initial hiccups pleased the Badminton World Federation (BWF).

The world body was impressed with the ability of the local police and the organisers and patted them for ensuring fool-proof security and a comfortable stay for over 350 players and officials from 42 participating nations.

The English team's pull-out a day before the beginning of the event, following a media report of a terror threat, had cast a cloud on the championship but the BWF was convinced by the assurance from the Cyberabad police on the outskrits of Hyderabad that there was no real threat from terrorists and that they were quite capable of tackling any eventuality.

'We are happy and satisfied with the security provided for the championships. The police took all necessary steps to allay any apprehensions among the participants after the pull-out by the English team,' BWF chief operating officer Thomas Lund said.

He pointed out that only one team returned home but all the others stayed back as they had full faith in the security being provided by authorities here.

The Cyberabad police had deployed 1,000 security personnel, including 45 armed guards trained in anti-terror operations, as part of the fool-proof security for the mega event.

'In the beginning there were some problems of security and swine flu but from the fourth day, there was no problem. The last three days of the tournament went on very well,' K. Ch Punnaiah Choudhary, the organising secretary of the World Badminton Championships, told IANS.

'They (BWF) told us that the security for players and the officials was the highest of any championships. They were happy over all the arrangements and said they will come back to India and Hyderabad for future tournaments,' he said.

A day after the event concluded, the Badminton Association of India (BAI) held a meeting here Monday to review the conduct of the championships. 'We analysed the good and bad things about the championships.