Divya Gokulnath roots for India’s FIFA qualification after Byju’s faces backlash over Messi deal

Byju’s has bagged the sponsorship deal for FIFA World Cup 2022.

Byju's co-founder Divya Gokulnath rooted for India’s qualification at the next football World Cup, saying that the Indian team a strong chance to make it to the final 48 teams for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

“Too often we find the label ‘pipe dream’ attached to India’s chances of playing in the FIFA World Cup. I beg to disagree. I am sure India will not only qualify for the World Cup; it will also win it at least once in my lifetime,” Gokulnath wrote in a LinkedIn post, along with a video by Byju’s made on the same peg.

India is at 106th position on FIFA’s ranking of countries, behind teams like Cyprus, Mauritania and Guinea-Bissau and just above Sierra Leone and Kosovo.

Byju’s has bagged the elite and high stake sponsorship deal for FIFA World Cup 2022 which is being held in Qatar.

Her post comes days after the Bengaluru-headquartered company faced backlash for signing Lionel Messi, one of the world’s highest paid footballers, as a brand ambassador soon after laying off 2,500 employees in a bid to make the edtech firm more profitable.

Opening up about the Messi deal, Divya Gokulnath told The Economic Times that the decision to sign Messi as the Global Brand Ambassador for its "Education For All" social initiative was rooted in a desire to give the initiative more reach and visibility.

“It is sad that there has to be a Messi coming on board to give voice to Education For All,” she said, noting that nobody “picked up” the story before Messi was brought on board.

Speaking about the layoffs, Gokulnath had said, “How much we say and apologise, it is not enough. It would be the last thing that we would want to do but sometimes what Byju and Divya want is not what Byju’s as a company demands.

“We did it because this would help us move towards our path to profitability by the fourth quarter of this year. Certain steps had to be taken and they were taken,” she said.