Praful Patel elected AIFF president

Praful Patel was unanimously elected president of the All India Football Federation at its Annual General Body Meeting, at Football House, the AIFF's headquarters, in Delhi on Thursday.

The AGM and elections were held in the presence of Ms. Radhica Sreeman, observer on behalf of the Government of India (also the Regional Director, SAI; P C Makholia, on behalf of the Sports Authority of India; Mun Si Song, representative Asian Football Confederation and Dr Shaji Prabhakaran, FIFA Regional Developmental Officer, South and Central Asia.

FIFA consultant Monika Staab was also present on the occasion.

Justice S K Agarwal, a retired Judge of the Delhi high court was the returning officer.

Justice Agarwal, who was appointed returning officer at AIFF's last Executive Committee meeting (on November 20, 2012), declared: "The elections have been held in consonance with the Sports Code guidelines and the AIFF Constitution at the same time. All nominated persons for the post of office-bearers and executive committee members were elected unanimously. I declare all of them elected and would like to congratulate them."

Thanking all the affiliated members, Patel said: "I express my gratitude to all for keeping the faith in me. The AIFF has been trying its best to live up to the expectations of the players, spectators and all other stake holders."

Kushal Das, the general secretary of the AIFF, mentioned that the elections were held as per the Spirit of the Sports Code.

"The guidelines relating to age and tenure have been fully complied with. I would also like to mention, that contrary to the recent reports, the AIFF did circulate the Electoral College well in advance on November 23, 2012," Das said.

The office-bearers:\

Praful Patel (Re-elected president)

Shrinivas V. Dempo (vice-president, West)

K M I Mather (vice-president, south).

Subrata Dutta (vice-president, east).

Subhash Chopra (vice-president, north).

Larsing Sawyan (vice-president, north-east).

Hardev Jadeja (re-elected treasurer).

Amit Ranjan Dev (re-elected as executive committee member, west).

Franco Miranda (executive committee member, west).

A. R. Khaleel (executive committee member, south).

Menla Ethenpa (executive committee member, east).

Ghulam Rabbani (executive committee member, east).

Sunil Bharadwaj (re-elected executive committee member, north).

Md. Shamsuddin (executive committee member, north).

Ankur Datta (executive committee member, north-east).

Ranjit Roy (re-elected executive committee member, north-east).