THE GOLDEN ERA OF INDIAN CHESS BEGINS

India has proved that it is the master of the King of Games. The victory of two team and four individual gold medals clearly showcased the dominance of young minds during the 2024 FIDE Chess Olympiad in Budapest. History was created with the top five chess live ratings.

The performance of the talented golden generation has attracted the world's attention so much that the victorious team was hosted by none other than Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The PM lauded India's young chess players for their historic achievement at the 45th Chess Olympiad, where both the men's and women's teams clinched their maiden gold medals.

Every Indian who witnessed Indian Chess players address the world media at Budapest after the dominant performance was a red-letter day for the Indian sports since both Indian men and women proved to the world that we are the masters of the game.

Earlier in the nineties when the Soviet Union collapsed, a reputed Indian Journalist Sekhar Gupta was interviewing Garry Kasparov. Then the Indian player Viswanathan Anand was referred to as a rising star. Kasparov dismissed Sekhar Gupta’s notion saying that Anand had no chance of getting into the big league. But Anand proved Kasparov wrong. The same Anand emerged as challenger to Gary Kasparov and later scripted a history by winning five world championships. Later Kasparov himself acknowledged Anand as a force to reckon with in the chess world.

In the recent times, Magnus Carlsen dismissed Gukesh Dommaraju was no match to Fabio Karuna in the world challenger tournament in Toronto but Gukesh pulled off a sensational win over Fabio Caruna ultimately becoming the challenger for Ding Liren for the world crown. Later, Magnus confessed that he erred in judgement over Gulesh’s abilities.

These instances reflect how opponents underestimated the Indians' talent at the world stage. But this time the world was accepting such a feat from Indians the men were seeded second and women were top seeded but seeding does not work in Olympiads. In such tournaments where 190 countries participate it is tough to secure gold irrespective of seedings.

Sometimes underdogs pull off upset wins. Indian women got the taste of it when Poland defeated Indians putting their medal chances at stake. But Indian women recovered after that defeat and continued their fine form in reaching top. But the world was amazed by men’s domination; they won 10 of their matches and drew others. They finished with 21 points while the runner up and top seeds United States could manage only 17 points.

The USA team consisted of great players like Wesley So and Fabio Caruna but they were not able to breach the formidable Indians. Indian non-playing captain Srinath made smart moves off the board by fielding World No 5 Arjun Ergilasi on the third board which paid rich dividends. Magnus called Arjun a madman of chess indicating aggressive style of decimating opponents. Arjun compensated the off form Praggnandha’s losses on the second board while another player Vidit Gujarathi lived up to expectations of his Indian team and scored facile wins over opponents.

Gukesh on the top board gave sterling performance particularly his games against Wei Yei and Fabio Caruna. Particularly against the Chinese GM, he was staring at the defeat but Gukesh pulled off a brilliant win by using extraordinary end game techniques which experts called it as a game to remember in chess history. Harikrishna as a reserve player played his part in the Indian victory.

For the Indian team, though the top seed had many problems they went to Budapest without their top player Koneru Humpy (World No.6). Their mentor Abijit Kunte had to make smart moves in utilising the talents where India women were not as dominant as the men’s team.

But slowly steadily they peaked; particularly two youngest ladies Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal, on lower boards after the team suffered setbacks in mid of the tournament, held their nerves and dished out brilliant games en route their title. In the final round when Harika defeated her Azerbaijan opponent she broke down and her mentor Abijit Kunte patting her summed up the entire scene of winning the title.

Though the tournament has lost some of its sheen because of the absence of Russian and Belarus teams which were banned by FIDE due to sanctions and absence of top players like Hikaru Nakamura, it does not minimise the glory of India teams. Indians had also another reason to cheer that 9-year-old Indian origin girl Bodhana Sadanad representing England at the Olympiad was hogging the limelight at the tournament.

Until the eighties we had only Manuel Aaron, international master of repute. After that Dibeyendru Barua and Pravin Thipsay showed some promise but didn’t move forward but lighting kid Anand changed the entire scenario. He was called the Father of Indian chess revolution and GM Nakamura commented Indian teams as Anand’s chess kids. Now India boasts of 85 Grand Masters and their teams winning Olympiads is another sign of Indian domination for the years to come.

In November Tania Sachdev in women's P Harikrishna contributed their mite as reserve players and also Harikrishna, Harika and Arjun represented Telugu pride at world level.

Gukesh will be playing Ding Laren of China in Singapore for the world Crown. The whole India is praying for Gukesh’s success. If he becomes World Champion it will be another big day for Indian sport. The highlight of this tournament is foreign Journalists introducing the shy mother of two winning GMs Praggnanda and Vaishali. This is a real tribute to an Indian woman who was instrumental in making real champions. Finally, Chaturanga chess came back to its mother land and it will stay.

(Writer is an executive of Union Bank of India and a sports enthusiast)