East Bengal and Emami sort out differences, tie-up on the right track

East Bengal club officials had raised some issues in the agreement as differences cropped up after the deal between the two parties was agreed in presence of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on April 26. Racing against time to build the team for the upcoming Indian Super League season, the two parties met on Wednesday for a discussion on the draft agreement.

Describing the meeting as "fruitful", both the parties in a joint statement said: "Emami and East Bengal are happy to inform that everything is on the right track and will progress very fast." On the issues in the agreement, they said: "While most of the points were already cleared between both the parties, today's meeting helped to clear the remaining points positively. "The lawyers of both parties will now jointly prepare the final draft of the agreement for execution as soon as possible.

"Both Emami and East Bengal Club will also make efforts to put together a good and strong team ASAP." The century-old club had two disastrous ISL seasons playing under the aegis of 'SC East Bengal'. In their ISL debut in 2020-21, they finished ninth out of 11 teams, and in the last season they finished rock-bottom as their association with Shree Cement Ltd ended prematurely.

Before SCL, Quess Corp had bought a 70 per cent stake in East Bengal in 2018 but the relationship soured between the two entities and it lasted for two years before the Bengaluru-based group parted ways in June 2020.