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Mohun Bagan Super Giant have urged the All India Football Federation to acknowledge players having Overseas Citizenship of India card as domestic players, which would encourage Indian Super League clubs to bring them onboard for the upcoming season.

AIFF wants one OCI player to be in the starting XI of top-tier ISL but majority of the 14 clubs remain apprehensive to the idea for several factors including escalating costs and inadequate talent pool.

These clubs have voiced their reservations to AIFF, who have insisted on it being only a proposal at this point though an official communique after its special general meeting on June 20 claimed otherwise.

Reigning ISL champions East Bengal and Mohun Bagan are the only two clubs who remain open to the idea with their CEO Vinay Chopra suggesting AIFF to make signing of OCI players optional while introducing an age limit for them.

“… it has to be optional and the OCI player can be treated as a domestic player. Then only the clubs will be incentivised to bring in more and more OCI Player,” Chopra wrote to the federation.

“There has to be an upper limit in age for the OCI Player. For example, 35 year old OCI player will not make sense for the purposes we want to implement it.”

An age cap would ensure that bleeding clubs won’r have to shell out big bucks for OCI players who are past their prime, while identifying them as domestic players could hasten the process of them being eligible to play for the national team.

“There can be 2 approaches to it,” Chopra said.

“One for short term benefit an upper limit of 30 year can be imposed on the OCI Player, who can get a passport in two years and can play India for three years, something like that.

“Alternatively, we can give this incentive of signing OCI player as domestic player to clubs for younger players say below U26 targeting 2034 World Cup.

“Maybe we can also allow up to maximum of 2/3 OCI players per club as domestic players to fast track this process.

Clubs expect a communication from AIFF soon on the number of foreigners for the 2026-27 season.

A formal meeting is also on the cards over the league’s structure and organisation after AIFF was persuaded to accept a club-led model.