Praful Patel (President, All India Football Federation) chaired AIFF’s Annual General Body Meeting which was held at the Football House on Friday. The day also witnessed the Special General Body Meeting (SGBM) which was held just prior to the AGBM.

Besides Patel, the AGBM and SGBM were held in the presence of AIFF General Secretary Kushal Das, Vice-Presidents Subrata Dutta, KMI Mather, Larsing Sawyan, Subhash Chopra, Treasurer Hardev Jadeja, AIFF Executive Committee Members and Member Associations.

Dr. Shaji Prabhakaran (FIFA Regional Developmental Officer, South and Central Asia) and IMG-R representatives Ashu Jindal and Priti Srivastava later graced the Meeting for the AGBM.

The SGBM was held to make amendments into the AIFF Constitution as per the directions given by the Government of India which were unanimously passed by all. Keeping it in consonance with the Sports Code guidelines, the Constitution was thus amended:

“(…) The President, the Vice-Presidents, the Treasurer and the Members of the Executive Committee shall be elected by the General Body for a period of four years, however, the President and the Treasurer shall cease to hold that post on attaining 70 years of age (…)”

It was also amended as such:

“(…) The President may hold the office for a maximum period of twelve years with or without break.

The Treasurer may serve a maximum of two successive terms of four years each after which a minimum cooling off period of four years will apply to seek fresh election (…)”

AIFF President Praful Patel in his address to the Special General Body Meeting said: “Keeping in mind the best practices which we should follow, we have some amendments to make. There are certain principles to be adopted by us in view of the directives from the Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs.”

“We are a national sports federation and therefore we have to follow the guidelines of the ministry and the Government of India from time to time. Keeping all the issues in mind we have adopted the necessary changes which to bring our Constitution in line with the Sports Code,” the President added.

Further, Patel said: “There were certain anomalies in our Constitution which needed to be changed as was proposed by Mr. Dutta. Now our Constitution has absolute clarity.”

The President also laid stress on the three important years from 2015 to 2017 when apart from hosting the prestigious FIFA U-17 World Cup India may get also the right to host the FIFA Club World Cup. “We are officially bidding for the Club World Cup in January 2014,” he informed.

Meanwhile, Kushal Das stated: “I’d also like to mention that the elections which were held last year were held as per the spirit of the Sports Code and the guidelines relating to age and tenure have been fully complied with last year itself.”

He also stressed on AIFF’s activities. “Grassroots, Youth Development, Coach Education and Referees Development are the key areas for taking Indian football forward.”

Sara Pilot (Executive Committee Member & Chairperson of Women’s Committee, AIFF) provided an insight into Women’s Football via a detailed presentation.

The Awards for the 2013 AIFF Player of the Year (both Men and Women), the 2013 AIFF Emerging Player of the Year were also announced by Patel during the meeting [+ read more].

(Edited AIFF Report / Picture courtesy AIFF Media)