The government's late-night application in the Supreme Court agreeing to FIFA's conditions for the ban to be lifted may seem like a huge concession but it was a fairly simple task. FIFA's biggest sticking point was the inclusion of 36 eminent ex-footballers in the electoral college for the August 28 elections; this was a clear and massive violation of FIFA's rule that only elected state associations and not nominated individuals can elect the central administrative body.
The rationale for this change by the Committee of Administrators was to ensure the election, and the new constitution the CoA was framing, adhered to the National Sports Code. However, the government's recommendation to remove this specific 36-person condition will not go against the provisions of the NSC. That's because the NSC itself does not stipulate the inclusion of eminent ex-players in the electoral body.
"Nowhere does the Sports Code require that", says sports lawyer Nandan Kamath, managing trustee of GoSports Foundation. "What it requires is that there should be a significant number of athletes in the governance, which is essentially the executive board ('say upto 25%', as per the Code)."
This, too, has been mentioned by the government in its Sunday application: 6 out of 23 people in the AIFF's new executive committee will be eminent players. This, Kamath explains, won't be an issue with FIFA. "FIFA have no objection to the 25% requirement [as sought in the NSC], they are saying that only representatives of the state associations should form the Electoral College and be entitled to vote in the election of AIFF office bearers and the AIFF executive board."
This is further elaborated within the NSC itself. The model election guidelines prescribed in it say that elections should be held amongst the state bodies that constitute it.
"Election shall be held at the Annual General Council Meeting (AGM)... from amongst the representatives of the permanent member states/union territories/boards/institutions."
"Each Permanent member state/UT duly affiliated by [in this case, AIFF] shall have two votes at elections of the Office Bearers and Managing Committee Members."
It also goes on to say those two votes would come from "two members authorized by the President or Secretary General/Secretary of the affiliated permanent member state/UT."
All of these guidelines are perfectly in line with FIFA Statutes.
The loose interpretation of the NSC is possible because it's not a law. "The National Sports Code is what is known as administrative direction, it's not a legislation or law but is binding on the various bodies in the absence of a legislation," Kamath says. "What the provisions of the NSC essentially become are minimum standards for the recognition of NSFs by the Sports Ministry... so unless you meet that requirement you are not eligible for annual recognition as a NSF. These are the baseline, raising the bar to higher standards would not violate the NSC."
This gives the CoA or anybody making a new constitution to insert stronger governance policies: but a pertinent point here could be that in the various clauses the NSC also notes that the federation should be in "consonance", "conform to" the rules and principles laid down by the respective International Federation. In fact, it's a requirement that "Where an international federation for the sports exists, the National Federation must be affiliated to the respective international federation," which essentially entails following their statutes.
This also means that other aspects of the constitution which are proposed to be revamped could continue to be done.