New Delhi: Alleged age fudging by a section of the state associations has reduced the ongoing qualification rounds of the National under-16 football championship to a complete farce in Jamshedpur and Mumbai.

So much so, that two of the strongest football playing states — Bengal and Goa — have already crashed out. Both the teams, their officials claimed, were beaten by states, who had host of over-age footballers in their line-ups.

To make the matter worse, the All India Football Federation (AIFF) has so far remained a mute spectator to the entire episode despite receiving a series of complains.

Bengal were crying foul from the Day One of the East Zone qualifiers in Jamshedpur and even submitted a written protest after they were beaten by Jharkhand in the semi-finals.

“Some of the states, I believe, had fielded a lot of over-age players, which went completely unchecked,” said the IFA secretary, Utpal Ganguly.

“I have already written to the AIFF pointing them out how counter productive it was.”

The Goa football Association secretary, Savio Messias said he was frustrated by the happenings in the West Zone qualifiers in Mumbai.

“We seriously raised a genuine under-16 team only to be beaten by a bunch of older boys. When we lodged a protest, it was not even accepted by the match commissioner.”

AIFF sources admitted they were flooded with protests from different quarters but could do little.

“The state associations were clearly instructed to submit the wrist x-ray reports of all the players. What can be done if they submit tampered reports,” asked the official.

But then, the federation, too, played a major role in this mess. A decision taken two years ago to make it mandatory to conduct MRI scan for all the players in the under-16 tournament was revoked after some of the state associations said it was too costly.

Also, the AIFF has a ridiculous tournament rule (Article 22-1) that says any protest relating to qualification and eligibility of players must be submitted in the managers’ meeting at the start of the championship.

Under this, any protest, lodged during the course of the meet, can be conveniently dismissed.