 "ARAVINDH CHITHAMBARAM")
Four events in the last six months serve as useful markers of the past, the present and the likely future of Indian chess. The past has been glorious, but also largely a one-man show. The present features many strong players. The future could be very bright indeed. In particular, the advent of three prodigies should ensure momentum is maintained.
The four events in chronological order:
August 2014: In Tromsø, Norway, India won the bronze medal at the Olympiad.
September 2014: In Durban, Indians picked up the maximum number of medals, six, at the World Youth Chess Championships (an annual set of age-group tournaments). The haul included two golds for two 10-year-olds, Divya Deshmukh and Nihal Sarin .
November 2014: In Sochi, Russia, Norwegian grandmaster and world champion Magnus Carlsen retained the world title by beating challenger and former world champion, Viswanathan Anand.
December 2014: In Gyor, Hungary, India won the under-16 Youth Olympiad. Two 15-year-olds, Aravindh Chithambaram and Murali Karthikeyan, fulfilled the final rating requirements and became grandmasters.
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Born on: July 13, 2004
Title: Candidate Master
Elo Rating: 2110
Sarin is the highest International-rated player in the under-12 (born after January 2003) age category in India and 6th in the world.
International achievements
- September 2014: World under-10 classic open champion, Durban, South Africa
- June 2014: Asian under-10 rapid chess champion, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
- June 2014: Asian under-10 blitz chess champion, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
- December 2013: World under-10 blitz chess champion, Al Ain, UAE
Favourite sportsperson: Lionel Messi
Other sports and hobbies: Roller-skating, football
Born on: January 5, 1999
Title: Grandmaster
Elo Rating: 2501
International achievements
- Hungary, 2014: Team gold medal at World under-16 Youth Olympiad
- Dubai, 2013: World under-16 champion
- Brazil 2011: World under-12 champion
- Turkey 2009: World under-10 silver medallist
- Final Grandmaster norm: Abu Dhabi Masters 2014
Favourite sportsperson: Viswanathan Anand
Hobbies: Swimming, football
Born on: September 11, 1999
Title: Grandmaster
Elo Rating: 2504
International achievements
- Durban 2014: World under-16 silver medallist
- Hungary, 2014: Team gold medal at World under-16 Youth Olympiad
- Final Grandmaster norm: Riga Open 2014
Favourite sportsperson: Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand, Mahendra Singh Dhoni
Hobbies: Cricket, football
The world title match at Sochi indicated the end of a golden era. Between 1991 and 2014, the peerless Anand was either a title contender or the world champion. Anand's record is awesome. It includes five world title wins and defences as well as countless tournament victories (including three tournament wins in 2014). But Anand is 45 years old and he has lost two matches to Carlsen. While India's first grandmaster remains one of the world's strongest players, he cannot be expected to carry on forever.
India now has a very broad base and quite a large number of elite players. When Anand played his first title match against Garry Kasparov in 1995, there were only two Indian grandmasters. Now, there are 38 (including the two 15-year-olds). There are also over 43,000 internationally registered players, giving India the largest active chess-playing population in the world.
The bronze medal at Tromsø shows India's current depth in the sport. The team was missing its two best players (Anand and Pendyala Harikrishna). There were three 21-year-olds (Parimarjan Negi, SP Sethuraman and Lalith Babu) one 22-year-old (Baskaran Adhiban) and an elder statesman, Krishnan Sasikiran (34). The team tied Russia, Azerbaijan and Hungary for the second-fifth spots (winning third place on tiebreak) and outperformed powerhouses like Ukraine and Armenia.
There was a glimpse of the future at Durban, where Sarin produced a mature performance to take gold with a round to spare. At Gyor, India pipped Russia and China, among others, to grab gold. Chithambaram, Karthikeyan and Sarin - individually and collectively, these three are among the most talented players in the world. They already have several extraordinary achievements to their credit.
Sarin is a world champion in his age group, both in classical (slow play) and blitz categories. Karthikeyan has won world titles at U-12 and U-16 levels. Aravindh has a silver medal in the world U-16. More interestingly, he has twice won tournaments against strong adult opposition with scores that indicate that he is already a match for the world's top players when on song.
Aravindh and Karthikeyan are based in Chennai. While neither set age records in claiming the grandmaster title (Sergei Karjakin did it before turning 13), the pair are among the youngest grandmasters in the world at present. Becoming a grandmaster involves logging at least three high scores against good opposition (called "norms") and also having the consistency to maintain a high minimum rating. Sarin is based in Thrissur, Kerala. He is a long way from the grandmaster title, but at a bit over 10 years in age, he has plenty of time.
All three have access to dedicated coaching and to the electronic paraphernalia of computerised databases, chess-playing programs and Internet chess sites. Aravindh is a student at Chess Gurukul, an academy run by Grandmaster RB Ramesh. Karthikeyan works with K Viswesvaran. Sarin is coached by EP Nirmal.
The access to formal coaching is in stark contrast to the Anand era. The maestro learnt chess from his mother. But he was a 22-year-old title contender before he acquired his first coach. Nowadays, there are coaches - and good ones at that - available in many chess centres across the country.
Aravindh and Sarin both learnt chess from their maternal grandfathers. Karthikeyan learnt from his father. All of them honed their games with professional help from an early stage. They have very different playing styles. But all three are mature technicians with a good sense of tournament strategy. If one may use a cricket analogy, they know when to use a straight bat and when to slog and they also know how to use a straight bat or the long handle.
More than human coaching, the access to databases, computerised analysis and strong opposition on the Web are force-multipliers. Before the infotech revolution in the 1990s, hand-written notebooks and index cards were used to record games. Accessing games played in obscure places was difficult. A new idea (or a "novelty" in chess jargon) could be used several times before the opposition learnt about it.
Nowadays, most tournaments are broadcast live. Databases automatically save, collate and classify games as they are played. Chess playing engines are very strong. A free program running on a smartphone could beat Carlsen. A commercial program running on a modern desktop would utterly outclass the world champion. Websites also operate 24x7, which means a player can find opponents to practise against at any place, any time.
But while chess may be easier to play and learn nowadays, it is still very expensive to pursue with some degree of seriousness. Computer hardware, coaching, commercial programs and multi-million game databases all cost money. So does travelling while playing on the circuit. Plus, it is usually a gamble. Elite players -say the top 100 or so - make decent money. The rest struggle to meet expenses. An enormous commitment in time and trouble has to be made. A youngster, or rather the youngster's parents, must take a call on whether it's worth that sort of money and effort.
Understandably, parents hedge their bets by ensuring that the kids get a decent education too. But that means tournament schedules must conform to exam schedules. Aravindh, for example, is preparing for Class X exams, and chess will take a backseat for some time. Karthikeyan is in Class XI and set to take a chunk of next year off for his exams. Sarin too will be focused on studies for a while because he took time off earlier this academic year.
Sponsorships and stipends are a necessity unless the players hail from wealthy families. This trio certainly doesn't. Sarin's parents are perhaps the most stable, since both are doctors engaged by the Kerala government. Karthikeyan's father, R Murali, is a junior engineer with the North Chennai Thermal Power Station. Aravindh's widowed mother, Deivanai, supports her family with the commissions she earns as an agent for the Life Insurance Corporation of India.
None of the families can afford to send the boys abroad frequently. Ramesh coaches Aravindh for free (the family moved from Madurai to Chennai in part to ensure access to Gurukul). The youngster also gets a stipend from ONGC. The Kerala State Chess Association and its secretary, Rajesh Nattakom, have backed Sarin. But more support would be very useful for all three.
In terms of style, Karthikeyan is what might be called a traditional player. He works hard on his openings and he tries to understand the lines he plays in great depth. He is also a sharp tactician with quick sight of the board. Arvind Aaron, who was the coach-cum-manager of the Indian team at the 2010 World Youth Championships in Porto Carras, Greece, says, "Karthikeyan was dedicated enough to forego trips to the beach. He worked constantly, even on rest days."
Ramesh was in charge of the team that won the Youth Olympiad at Gyor and he says he was also very impressed with Karthikeyan's play and work ethic. He says, "There's a minor temporary phenomenon in that he sometimes allows weaker players to grab draws. He hasn't yet learnt the art of deliberately playing a slightly inferior move to keep the pressure on. His results will jump once he learns that."
Sarin is already known on the circuit as being hyperactive to the point where photographers complain that he rarely sits down. International Master V Koshy, who once worked with the boy at a coaching camp, says, "Nihal is an extraordinary talent - too impatient, always wriggling around. But he sees everything and grasps it fast. He's also very mature - he builds attacks rather than look for quick solutions." Sarin says his chess hero is Alexander Alekhine, the Russian genius who was the fourth (1927-1935) and sixth (1937-1946) world champion. He likes Alekhine's style of building massive attacks that peak with violent complications. He is also not averse to long games, and has won a number of 90-movers.
Aravindh is unusual in that he is not very well prepared in the openings. Ramesh, who has coached him for two years now, says, "The boy has a very sharp memory but he doesn't really focus on opening theory. We will work on this after his board exams. He's become a good defender because he often gets into inferior positions and also has to handle time-trouble because he doesn't know the openings well."
The young man is also unusual among Chennaiites in that he openly admits to admiring Carlsen as a chessplayer, before hastily adding, "And Anand Sir, of course!" Stylistically, he is clearly a Carlsen follower. He likes long games, avoids opening theory and has a superb endgame technique. He also has a quiet self-assurance; if he manages to get into a good position, he knows he can beat anyone and he has often won big games in last-round pressure situations.
Two of Aravindh's grandmaster norms (Chennai 2013 and Riga 2014) were extraordinary. He won strong tournaments, rolling over high-class grandmaster opposition and easily exceeding norm requirements. If he had maintained that form consistently, he would have been in the World Top 30. But then, young players are frequently erratic and he has had his share of under-par performances.
There are other strong young players scattered across the country. But these three seem to come closest to fitting the classic definition of a prodigy. Chinese Grandmaster Wei Yi is also 1999-born, and he's much stronger than Aravindh or Karthikeyan at the moment. But young players don't develop linearly and consistently. They have "growth spurts" in chess strength and understanding, just as they tend to suddenly shoot up in height. These three should serve India well in future if the growth spurts keep coming.
