New Delhi: All India Football Federation (AIFF) President Kalyan Chaubey on Thursday issued a legal notice to former Andhra Pradesh official Gopalakrishna Kosaraju for levelling "false, malicious and defamatory allegations" after the latter accused him of using AIFF credit cards for buying personal things.
Chaubey, through his lawyer, gave an ultimatum of seven days to Kosaraju for public apology or face legal consequences. The AIFF president also asserted that he "reserves the right to seek compensation for damages incurred as a result of the false and defamatory statements" against him.
The controversy ignited when Kosaraju, a former president of the Andhra Pradesh Football Association (APFA), wrote an email to the executive committee members of the AIFF on January 29, stating that Chaubey had misused AIFF credit cards for the self benefits.
Chaubey, on the other hand, "explicitly and unequivocally" rejected the allegations made and termed them as fiction and the "vindictive imagination" of Kosaraju.
Sudarshan Kumar Agarwal, Chaubey's Kolkata-based lawyer served a legal notice that reads, "The unwarranted public dissemination of a defamatory e-mail, containing unsubstantiated allegations of financial misconduct, not only lacks accuracy but also unjustly undermines my client's well-earned reputation...caused substantial harm to (his) personal and professional standing."
"News reports, tweets, and videos, wherein the wild, unfounded, false, baseless, and per se, defamatory allegations imagined and conceptualised by the Notice are being further propagated and thereby cause further prejudice, damage and injury to my client's reputation and goodwill before the public at large. ... (these are) designed to curry political mileage and extract personal vendetta, owing to the Noticee's defeat against my client's panel by a margin of 33-1 in the elections of the AIFF (in September 2022), and do not have an iota of truth,” the statement added.
AIFF President Chaubey claimed that he had never taken any personal benefit from any fund while discharging his duties from the top position. Instead, he asked Kosaraju to "immediately desist from further disseminating this defamatory e-mail" or making any public statements that cast aspersions on his character, integrity or professional conduct.
"Issue a written public apology to my client for inventing fictitious, false, per se defamatory, and malicious allegations against my client in terms of your email dated January 29, 2024. The apology should be disseminated through the same channels as the original defamatory communication to ensure it reaches the same audience. My client reserves the right to seek compensation for damages incurred as a result of the false and defamatory statements made in the email. This may include legal costs, reputational damage, and any other losses suffered by my client, ” the statement added.
"In the event, that you fail to comply with the above within seven days from the receipt of this notice, my client will be constrained to initiate appropriate proceedings to protect his rights and interests...such failure will leave my client with no choice but to pursue legal remedies available to him, of both a civil and criminal nature, under the applicable laws." (With PTI inputs)
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