AIFF elections on December 20; Federation to not pay from its coffers for India vs Brazil

File photo: Kalyan Chaubey (centre) is the current AIFF president, having been elected on September 2, 2022, for a four-year term.  | Photo Credit: AIFF media

The fresh elections of the All India Football Federation (AIFF) will take place on December 20, as decided in its Special General Meeting (SGM) in Kolkata on Sunday.

The previous AIFF elections were held on September 2, 2022, when Kalyan Chaubey took charge for a four-year term. Though the new polls were supposed to take place at the end of his reign, they were postponed after the National Sports Governance Act 2025 came into effect, and the decision was consequently approved by FIFA.

The SGM had AIFF’s top brass in attendance, with the election date among the key matters on the agenda. Accordingly, the election date was confirmed with former state election commissioner of Haryana, Rajeev Sharma, serving as the presiding officer.

The State Associations were told to wrap up their respective elections by November 4.

The Federation officials are in Kolkata, with the Indian men’s international team playing South American heavyweights Brazil and Uruguay on October 3 and 6, after facing Panama in Bengaluru on September 25.

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Brazil and Uruguay charge around USD 5 million and USD 2 million for playing international matches away from home. The payment to those teams was also discussed at the meeting, where questions were raised about whether the transaction – being a sum involving over Rs. 5 Cr. — was done keeping the AIFF Finance Committee aware of the cost analysis.

However, Chaubey clarified that money to the teams will not be paid from the Federation’s coffers and thus will not fall under the Finance Committee.

Ticketing during the India vs Brazil match was also discussed at length at the meeting. Despite having an official attendance of over 51,000, the stadium looked relatively empty.

It is learnt that around 16,500 tickets were sold while about 40,000 complimentary passes were handed out. No officials from the Federation or the ticketing department were available to comment on the numbers. Moreover, the Indian Football Association (the state federation of West Bengal) was to get 2,000 tickets for the match, but they did not receive them.