Das, Dhar to represent AIFF at June 7 AFC meeting

General secretary Kushal Das and I-League CEO Sunando Dhar will represent the All India Football Federation (AIFF) at the June 7 meeting of all stakeholders at the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

AIFF president Praful Patel will skip the meet where all I-League and Indian Super League (ISL) clubs have been invited to discuss the next course of action as Football Sports Development Ltd (FSDL), the organisers of ISL, mulls a longer league adding at least three more franchises to the existing eight.

"Me and Sunando will attend the meeting in Kuala Lumpur," Das told IANS on Monday.

The meeting, which will be chaired by the AFC General Secretary Dato' Windsor John, will be attended by the appropriate AFC Directors.

Senior representatives from FIFA, as well as senior representatives from the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Government of India have also been invited.

Windsor John was recently in New Delhi at the invitation of Patel to discuss the future roadmap for Indian football. It was there that the June 7 meeting was decided.

Currently, the AIFF and FSDL are in a fix on including city giants East Bengal and Mohun Bagan in the newly planned longer league as both outfits have not submitted the bid documents, refusing to budge from their three-point demands.

The two bigwigs have refused to pay franchise fee of Rs 15 crore and have also asked for money from the central revenue pool and said they would like to play their home games in Kolkata.

In a meeting recently with state body Indian Football Association (IFA), the clubs said the venue won't be a problem as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has said an amicable solution will be reached after talking to three clubs which includes ISL champions Atletico de Kolkata.

The IFA is supposed to send a mail to the AIFF asking about the "roadmap", which was promised to them by president Patel during the May 7 meeting in Mumbai.

--IANS

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