'AIFF strategic plan' aims to improve facilities in provisional FIFA U-17 World Cup

New Delhi: Keen on restructuring and laying a path for development of State Associations, All India Football Federation (AIFF) is launching a pilot project in seven states across the country. The project kicks-off in Kolkata and would visit the other five provisional venues for the FIFA 2017 U-17 World Cup – Delhi, Mumbai, Goa, Kochi and Guwahati. In addition, Mizoram Football Association has also been included for its involvement at the grassroot level and youth development. [caption id=“attachment_2335410” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational Image. Reuters[/caption] AIFF General Secretary Kushal Das said the project is a part of the four years “AIFF Strategic Plan”. “As per the Four Years Strategic Plan created with the help of FIFA, it was clear that the capacities of the State Associations need to be improved significantly for the development of Indian football. “Accordingly it was decided that the capacities of the six State Associations, which are the provisional venues must be enhanced to start with,” Das said. “Furthermore, as the Mizoram Football Association has put in a tremendous effort to start the revolution at the grassroots and youth development, they too have been included as part of the development plan,” he added. The initiative is fully supported by FIFA. “The onus is now on the respective State Associations to ensure they work together with FIFA and AIFF for the development of Indian football,” said Das. AIFF had in the first week of July advertised positions for the post of Technical Officers (in all the seven State Associations) and Director, Marketing & Operations (except for Mumbai), the interviews for which would be conducted soon. AIFF would be paying the salaries for the posts for a year, guiding and expecting the State Associations to become self sustainable and script own success after a year. The entire plan has been endorsed by the AIFF Executive Committee and FIFA would be conducting visits to each of the selected State Associations to discuss the implementation of the plan. The stakeholders include the local Associations, government, top division clubs and ex-players. PTI