East Bengal ink formal deal roping in Emami as investor

Soccer giants East Bengal on Tuesday inked a deal formalising as its investor a leading Kolkata-based personal and healthcare business conglomerate Emami Limited.
The deal was signed at a five-star hotel in central Kolkata in the presence of top East Bengal and Emami officials, and former and current players of the 103-year-old club.
As per the contract, the East Bengal club will hold 23 percent of shares, while Emami will own the remaining 77 percent shares of the newly formed Emami East Bengal private limited company.
The company’s 10-member board will have seven representatives from the business group,a nd three from East Bengal.
On April 26, the deal was agreed upon in the presence of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
Aditya V. Agarwal, Director, Emami Group, said the team’s nomenclature for the upcoming season would be East Bengal FC, and there were no plans to pre-fix the name of the investor before the club’s name.
“We believe that as corporates, we should come forward to provide a boost to the budding sportspersons right from the grassroots,” said Agarwal.
He said the business group had earlier teamed up with famous names from Indian sports from various disciplines. “From the legendary Milkha Singh to Sourav Ganguly, Sachin Tendulkar, Virendra Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, Gautam Gambhir to Saina Nehwal, Sania Mirza, Mary Kom, Sushil Kumar, we had so many sportspersons as our brand ambassadors,” he said.
In the mid-1990s the business group had been associated with East Bengal as a sponsor.
Club officials said they were happy and excited over the new partnership with the business group.
Over the recent past, East Bengal has had troubled relations with two investors, Quess Corp and Shree Cement Ltd.