'Credibility at stake', ex-general secretary Kushal Das rues 'mess' in AIFF

NEW DELHI: Kushal Das, the former general secretary of the All India Football Federation (AIFF), who oversaw the activities of Indian football for over a decade, has expressed shock over the recent developments in the game’s governing body.

Speaking to IANS, Das said, “I am shocked, surprised and at the same time saddened by what is happening in the Federation. I have worked in the AIFF for 12 years, and I have never seen anything like this before.”

Das’ remarks came after the now-removed legal advisor to AIFF, Nilanjan Bhattacharjee, levelled serious corruption allegations against federation president Kalyan Chaubey, which led to Bhattacharjee’s sacking on Tuesday.

The allegations followed the sacking of AIFF Secretary General Shaji Prabhakaran in November last year due to "breach of trust", a decision on which the Delhi High Court put a temporary stay earlier this year.

“I have heard of differences among elected members in other federations, but this is a direct confrontation between senior employees and the President, involving allegations of large-scale corruption.

“For the sake of football, I hope a proper solution is arrived at before it destroys the credibility of the AIFF completely,” Das told IANS

In fact, it was the duo of Chaubey and Prabhakaran who had opened a new chapter in the AIFF after the former became the first ex-player to get elected as the Federation President.

The duo started work raising new hope with lots of promises, before suddenly all hell broke loose.

Terming the duo as ‘inexperienced’, Das said they should have built up on the existing structure rather than trying to bring about a sea change.

“I think it was impractical to expect two people with no experience of running an organisation to bring about radical changes in a complex environment, in which the AIFF operates. In fact, there was no need for a big change.

“AIFF was fully functional with all departments properly manned and as the former CEO, I can say that all the departments had the right manpower, experience, capability, and competence to deal effectively with all the complexities,” Das told IANS.

The former AIFF official said the Indian Super League (ISL) was clearly established as the top league, and a clear roadmap for promotion and relegation between ISL and I league was put in place.

“The Indian Women’s League (IWL) was slowly growing. The men’s team had come down to within 100 in FIFA rankings. While efforts were being made to develop a robust youth development system, Indian Arrows, the U-20 team playing in the I-League, was regularly providing players for both ISL and I-League teams and subsequently to the senior national team.

“India successfully hosted a men’s U-17 as well as a women’s U-17 FIFA World Cup tournaments. A national centre of excellence was established for the first time. The finances of the federation were in very good shape with unprecedented reserves of over Rs 50 crore.

“So, all the new management had to do was to slowly build on the existing structure. Instead, because of their lack of experience and capabilities and perhaps personal ambitions, all this infighting started and destroyed not only the federation’s financial structure, but also the credibility with so many allegations of corruption,” Das said.

Asked if these charges and counter-charges are impacting the performance of the men’s football team, Das said he sincerely hopes that India does well in the upcoming qualifiers.

“I have read that the coach and the president do not communicate. With all that is happening in the AIFF, the morale of the national team is bound to be impacted and so will the performance. But I sincerely hope that India does well in the upcoming qualifiers in March,” he said.

⁠Though Das termed the allegations of corruption levelled against Chaubey and the treasurer as serious, he left it to the member associations take a call on it.

“Serious allegations of corruption have been levelled against the president and treasurer by the former legal head (Bhattacharjee) as well as a former president of Andhra Pradesh Football Association (Gopalakrishna Kosaraju) with documentary proof.

“The president and the executive committee are duty-bound to address such allegations. The president as well as the executive committee is elected by the member associations, and it’s really up to them to decide whether the president should continue,” Das concluded.