After indefinitely suspending the FIFA membership of the All India Football Federation (AIFF), the world’s governing body for football, FIFA, has laid down the conditions to be met in order to repeal its suspension which threatens to have catastrophic consequences for Indian football if the status quo remains.

FIFA sent a letter to the acting general secretary of AIFF stating that a lifting of the suspension shall only be possible after the ‘repeal of the CoA mandate in full’ and after FIFA is convinced that the AIFF administration is once again ‘fully in charge’ of its affairs.  FIFA also said that it will not accept the decision taken by the CoA to include former Indian internationals in the voters’ list for the AIFF elections. 

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The letter, sent by FIFA general secretary Fatma Samoura, said that the decision to suspend the AIFF had been made by the Bureau of FIFA Council due to flagrant violations of the FIFA statutes by the AIFF.

The issues had started when the AIFF was unable to hold its elections due to issues with finalising its constitution. The Supreme Court had then appointed a Committee of Administrators (CoA) to get things moving. A joint delegation from FIFA and the Asian Football Federation (AFC) had come to India where the terms and timelines for the formation of the new constitution and holding of the elections were agreed upon with the CoA.  However, FIFA found ‘serious deviations’ from the courses of action agreed upon, and felt that the actions of the CoA ‘constituted undue interference by a third party’.

Also read: FIFA suspends AIFF: What it means for Indian football

Samoura has mandated that the AIFF constitution will have to be ‘revised in accordance with the requirements of FIFA and AFC’ with no ‘interference from any third party’ in order for FIFA to repeal the ban. She also added that only the state associations will be allowed a say in the vote and that the CoA’s intentions of including players in the decision-making process will not be accepted.

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The situation is a calamitous one for Indian football as this suspension means that Indian teams are no longer entitled to take part in international competitions until the suspension is lifted.