Former India goalkeeper Henry Menezes is facing questions about a conflict of interest during his stint in the technical committee of the All India Football Federation (AIFF) given his daughter Nicole Menezes's role as the mental conditioning coach of the Indian under-17 World Cup team since January this year.

The team is currently preparing for the Fifa under-17 women's World Cup to be held in India in October.

Sources in the AIFF said this was a clear case of conflict of interest since Nicole landed the job when her father was part of the technical committee of the federation. Henry Menezes, they felt, should have resigned from the technical committee at the time of his daughter's appointment. The committee plays a role during the appointment of foreign coaches for the national teams.

The present committee, whose members do not get any remuneration from the AIFF for their services, was disbanded after the Supreme Court, on May 18, appointed a three-member Committee of Administrators to run the daily affairs of the AIFF. But Henry was very much a part of the Indian football set-up when Nicole, who did her masters of science in sports and exercise psychology from London's Brunel University, landed the job.

Conflict of interest doesn't always mean that a person is holding multiple posts in an organisation or has directly used his or her position to influence any appointment in the establishment. It's the perception which becomes the bigger issue when seeds of doubts are sown regarding certain recruitments.

"Yes, my daughter is with the under-17 World Cup team. I have nothing to do with her association with Indian football," Henry Menezes, who was vice-chairman of the committee which he had joined in 2013, told The Telegraph. Nicole is presently in Europe with the team coached by Thomas Dennerby.

Father-child conflict of interest is not new in Indian sport. After the RM Lodha committee recommendations were implemented in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), former India player Roger Binny had to resign as a selection committee member because his son Stuart was in a position to get into the Indian squad.

"Nobody is doubting Nicole's acumen as the mental conditioning coach but what surprises many is the fact that the ousted dispensation of the federation kept mum on the conflict of interest. Didn't they know she is Henry's daughter?" an official of a state association said. "The more you dig into the state of affairs in the AIFF, more skeletons are tumbling out of the closet." It has been learnt that even the CoA, till now, was not aware of the controversy.

Nicole has been associated with the Indian football system for some time now. A few former players who completed the AFC A licence coaching degree five years ago remember her as being a regular lecturer in sports psychology.