India’s first-ever Refereeing Academy has been inaugurated at the at O.C.A. Conference Hall, Cuttack today. The academy is run by the All India Football Federation (AIFF) and the Football Association of Odisha (FAO).

The inauguration ceremony of the “AIFF-FAO Refereeing Academy” hosted by Sahadev Rout (Head of Referees, FAO) took place in the presence of Col. Goutam Kar (Head of Referees, AIFF), Pradeep Nag (Vice Chairman, AIFF Referee’s Committee), Binod Singh (Fitness Instructor) and Susanta Chandra Mohanty (Tech Instructor).

The other dignitaries who were present at the function were the four FAO Vice-Presidents Bijay Das, Bhakta Ballav Das, Subrat Kumar Panda, Ramesh Ch. Mallick, besides M.A. Alam (Treasurer, FAO), Bikram K. Mohapatra (Joint-Secretary, FAO) and Avijit Paul (Joint-Secretary, FAO).

The new academy is part of the AIFF’s Master Plan to increase the level of the beautiful game in India.The AIFF will train referees at the academy to control and officiate higher level matches and adopt refereeing as a career.

A total of 20 referees have been selected for the one year long academy project in Cuttack. They will be teached refereeing through classroom lecturers with a focus on the laws of game, individual/group exercises, psychology and on-field training.

The AIFF is planning to set-up twelve such academies all around India in the next three years.