NEW DELHI: All India Football Federation (AIFF) president Praful Patel is reportedly all set to become the first Indian to be elected a member of FIFA executive council for a four-year period when elections are held in the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) headquarters in Kuala Lumpur on Saturday.
The executive council is FIFA’s highest decision making body and it has never had an Indian member in the past. Former AIFF president Priyaranjan Dasmunsi was once elected to the technical committee of FIFA.
Patel, who is currently vice president of the AFC, has decided not to run for a re-election and instead opted to stand for the FIFA body.
“It is an eight-corner contest for five spots from Asia in FIFA, but we are confident of Patel’s victory. He is being supported by AFC president Shaikh Salman and all other member countries will surely back him in the elections,” AIFF senior vice President Subroto Dutta told IANS on Monday.
As per new FIFA statutes adopted in 2016, the executive council is a 37-member body with AFC having the rights to send one vice president and six members, which include one female member. Led by the FIFA President, the council now has a wide range of powers and the secretary general will have to report to it regularly.
Apart from Patel, the seven other candidates cotesting are from China, Iran, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
Patel is currently serving his third term as AIFF president and his tenure would run till December 2020. Hosting the 2017 under-17 World Cup is considered one of his biggest achievements as the head of Indian football.
