Gukesh with 2 GM norms and 2490 Elo is on the verge of becoming world's youngest GM

09/12/2018 -

Around a year ago, all of us were waiting eagerly to see if Praggnanandhaa could beat Karjakin's record of becoming the youngest GM in the world. Pragg could not achieve that feat. However, here's another Indian prodigy who has a fair shot at breaking that record. He is D. Gukesh. Born on 29th of May 2006, Gukesh has until 29th of December 2018 to become a GM. While a few months ago, this looked highly improbable, Gukesh managed to score his 2nd GM norm, just yesterday at the Paracin closed GM Round Robin tournament in Serbia with a round to spare. He now has a live Elo of 2490 and he will be playing at the Sunway Sitges chess festival which begins on the 12th of December. If Gukesh can achieve his final GM norm there, he will become world's youngest GM beating Karjakin's record of 12 years and 7 months.

Bhakti Kulkarni - the national champion with an adorable smile and killer moves!

08/12/2018 -

She is most of the times smiling! A friendly, warm-hearted and kind person. These would be the right words to describe WGM Bhakti Kulkarni. But don't the good guys always finish last? Well, Bhakti is an exception. With her immense self belief and determination, she has been able to achieve some fantastic results in the year 2018, the biggest one being crowned as the National Champion of India. ChessBase India reached out to Bhakti for an exclusive interview in which she speaks about not only her National Championship but also her first World Championship appearance in Russia earlier this year. Interviews with Bhakti are always insightful and refreshing because she never holds anything back. This one is no exception! 

Kunal M. wins Ramco Open 2018

08/12/2018 -

Ramco was the first sponsor of our chess icon Viswanathan Anand and now it sponsors the third youngest grandmaster R. Praggnannandhaa and his sister R.Vaishali. Not to forget it also sponsored the Indian team at the Olympiad this year. Ramco Institute of Technology International FIDE Rated Open Chess Tournament 2018 was held from 29th November till 2nd December, 2018. The event was organised by RIT, a popular engineering college in Tamil Nadu, run by the Ramco Group of Industries. A total number of 313 players took part in the event from all over India including 1 GM, 4 IMs and 2 FMs. Kunal M. of Tamil Nadu who started as the 6th seed clinched the title by scoring 7.0/8 points. Chief Arbiter of the tournament IA R. Anantharam send us a detailed pictorial report of the event.

Lake City Open 2018 : IM R Balasubramaniam wins the grand festival in Udaipur!

07/12/2018 -

Udaipur is known as the city of lakes. With unparalleled beauty it is one of the most exciting places for tourists all across India and the world. The chess players are in for a treat as the "Chess in Lakecity" are making giant efforts to popularize the sport in their city. The 6th N.L. Pandiyar International FIDE Rating tournament was held from the 22nd to 25th of November 2018. With 353 participants, excellent prize fund and super star India no.3 Vidit Gujrathi visiting the venue, the event became the centre of attraction of chess fans all across the country. IM R. Balasubramaniam of Tamil Nadu won the championship. Atul Dahale, who was one of the participants in the tournament, sends us an elaborate report on his experience of playing in Udaipur. 

Dennis Kow scholarship of Rs.51,000 for the differently abled

07/12/2018 -

This is the third scholarship by the HelpChess Initiative of ChessBase India Foundation. This scholarship is specially instituted for differently abled players. This includes visually challenged, physically disabled, deaf and mute. Rs.51,000 have been contributed by the Jagadeesh family (Rs.30,000) and 9-year-old Suhaani Lohia (Rs.21,000). The scholarship is in the memory of Late Mr. Dennis Kow, a man who believed everyone in this world is special, and that chess is a wonderful game. The winner of the scholarship will be decided based on his/her achievements and suitability by the panel and the people who have instituted the scholarship. The last date for application is 25th of December 2018.

Express: Karthik Venkatraman and Sakshi Chitlange win National Juniors 2018

06/12/2018 -

The National Juniors 2018 came to an end in New Delhi from 28th November to 6th of December 2018. Top three players from both open and girls section will represent India at the World Juniors to be held next year in India! The winner in the open section was Karthik Venkatraman, the top seed, and the only GM in the tournament. In the girls section Sakshi Chitlange won the event by a half point margin ahead of Aakanksha Hagawane and Vantika Agarwal. In the open section Rakesh Kumar Jena and Nitish Belurkar finished second and third respectively. Express report by Jitendra Choudhary from the venue.

Straight from the heart - P. Karthikeyan shares his story of becoming a GM

06/12/2018 -

At the conclusion of the Third Saturday chess tournament in Novi Sad, Serbia, India got its 57th Grandmaster in Karthikeyan Pandian. In addition to finishing his much awaited final norm, the 28-year-old also finished joint first at the event. Two years back, Karthikeyan breached the 2500 rating threshold. Since he had completed all of his norms, many, including Karthikeyan himself, assumed that he had achieved the Grandmaster title. However, it was later discovered that there was a technical issue with one of his norms and, due to this, he was not conferred the Grandmaster (GM) title. It took two more years after this for Karthikeyan to score another norm and finally seal the title in his name. This was not an easy phase in his life and in this interview we catch up with the man .

One in a million - Darpan Inani, the strongest blind player of India - Part II

05/12/2018 -

Darpan Inani is the strongest blind player in India. Rated 2053, he has been a bronze medalist at the 2013 World Junior Championship in Belgrade. In 2010, he became the youngest player to win the National Blind Championship at the age of 16 years, a record which still stands. We caught up with Darpan for an elaborate interview. In this second part, Darpan discusses some of the high points of his career (the National Championship of 2010 and his bronze medal-winning performance at the World Junior Championship), his reasons for not being able to cross Elo 2100 and the role of his parents.

Countdown for IIFL 4 begins!

04/12/2018 -

IIFL is now a household name among the chess fraternity of India, thanks for the unflinching support from the IIFL Private Wealth - the one company which has become synonymous with chess in India. And now this grand event is a part of the 'Great Indian Chess Tour'. Pick any sport and you will always find a company backing it up financially to improve its infrastructure and standard. In chess, we have seen IIFL doing the same from the last three years. They have set a new standard and introduced their own flagship event, the Under-13 Championship, which is now the richest tournament for children in the world.  Once again, the IIFL International is here and is all set for its 4th edition which is much bigger than the last and with a new grand venue. In this article, Tournament Director, Praful Zaveri tells us about the forthcoming instalment of the event while also looking back at his experience from the previous editions.

World Youth U-16 Olympiad: India bags silver after an action-packed final round

04/12/2018 -

Team India was off to a wonderful start winning all of their first three games at the World Youth (Under-16) Championship in Konya, Turkey but their dream run was slowed down by losses in the fourth and the sixth rounds. Regardless, the team did not lose its morale. Round 7 onwards, they stacked up three back to back wins against high profile opponents like Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran to finish second on the podium. On board 1, Arjun Erigaisi won an individual silver thanks to his unbeaten 7.0/9. Sankalp Gupta was another Indian to take home a medal. Scoring 5 points out of his eight games, Sankalp finished with a rating performance of 2440 to clinch the bronze medal on board three. 

ACL Challengers League 2018: MCAA maintains lead, Intermezzo bounces back

03/12/2018 -

Maestro Chess Academy Attackers maintains their sole lead at the end of round 5 in ACL Challengers League 2018. Intermezzo, Royal Knight Chess Academy, d'pawn Chess Academy and Telugu Chess Warriors have qualified in the semi-finals. They all have qualified for ACL 2nd Super League which will take place in early 2019. MCAA made the tournament's first draw against MCAF. Intermezzo bounced back at the top with a win over RKCA and dpCA drew with their other lower rated team in the tournament. This report contains best games from round 5. Photo: CCCB/RKCA

Vishy Anand recaps Carlsen versus Caruana World Championship Match 2018

03/12/2018 -

The World Championship Match ended five days ago and we keep receiving mixed reviews from the spectators. While many of the viewers said that the match was dull and boring, we also have people who have opined that this was one of the best World Championships in terms of quality of play. When it comes to opinions, there can be no one better than five-time World Champion Vishy Anand. The legend has played innumerable matches for the highest title! He has been there and done that! Also he has played Carlsen in two World Championship Matches. It doesn't come as a surprise that his views were really appreciated by the chess world when we published a video on our YouTube Channel. The video has had over 82,000 views and in this article we have transcribed Vishy Anand's views along with the diagrams of the most important positions. 

India shines at the Western Asia Junior Championship 2018

03/12/2018 -

The Western Asia Junior Chess Championship was held from 16th November till 22nd November 2018 in the International Hotel Tashkent, Uzbekistan. There were 7 age categories for open and girls and more than 300 players from 11 western Asian countries took part in this grand event which had all the three format of the game. Our Indian players excelled in different categories and brought home 5 gold, 4 silver and 5 bronze medals from classical, rapid and blitz championship. In this report we bring you a pictorial report of the event with all the medal winners from India. It also includes annotated games by IM Nubairshah Shaikh who won a gold in the under-20 blitz.

Karthik Venkatraman on becoming India's 55th Grandmaster

02/12/2018 - Karthik Venkatraman became India's 55th grandmaster after a tumultuous run at the Spilimbergo Open held in August this year. Having played amazingly in the first seven rounds, Karthik suffered a major setback in round 8. He lost his first game of the event to Baadur  Jobava. The loss seemed to have done more damage than that of a point as Karthik's GM norm chances significantly diminished after this. In this interview, Karthik talks about his mindset during the tournament, his hectic tournament schedule and his ultimate aim as a chess player. | Thumbnail image: Gerhard Bertagnolli

Get Ready for Sunway Sitges International Chess Festival 2018!

01/12/2018 -

Sunway Sitges International Chess Festival is slated to be held in Sitges, Barcelona, Spain from the 13th to the 23rd of December 2018. The event boasts of being one of the strongest open events in the chess world, headlined this year by the Russian grandmaster, GM Dmitry Andreikin as the top seed and includes a long list of strong participants in the fray. Interesting participants include the brilliant Vassily Ivanchuk and prodigious Nihal Sarin and R. Praggnanandhaa. Read this curtain raiser by Rupali Mullick to find out more about this upcoming event.