Dehradun: The All India Football Federation invited the Akhtar Ali backed Uttarakhand Football Association at the Annual General Meeting in New Delhi on Thursday to further intensify the fight for supremacy in hill state football. Presently, the Akhtar Ali group is technically controlling football in Uttarakhand but two other groups have staked claim for the federation.
The 18 year record of Akhtar Ali group presents a sorry picture. The group has so far failed to host the state league. Despite this they continue to enjoy the confidence of the AIFF. Which is astonishing. Which also proves that AIFF pays lot of importance to old relationship, even if they are not doing adequate for promotion of the game in their region.
The Aryendra Sharma fraction and Dayal Rawat group were offended with the AIFF decision. In fact Aryendra Sharma was even elected president of the Uttarakhand State Football Association in one of the election held by Akhtar Ali group recently. The Dayal Rawat group had made state agriculture minister Subodh Uniyal its president. Both the group are discussing about taking legal action on the matter.
But Akhtar Ali is likely to face the heat. He is working as a District Sports Officer at Haldwani and after sports code was implemented in Uttarakhand he claimed having resigned from Uttarakhand Football Association. Despite this Ali attended the AIFF AGM. While various group have started making calls to their lawyers, DehradunFootball.com will do one simple thing. File a RTI with All India Football Federation asking one common question, "In which capacity Akhtar Ali was allowed to attend the AGM."
