What a year 2024 has been for Indian Chess!
Being closely associated with the field by virtue of working as a Gurgaon based online Chess coach for beginners, advanced beginners and intermediate level players, I am absolutely delighted with how the country's top players have performed this year!
At the start of the year, as per the January 2024 FIDE ratings, India had a good presence in the world rankings, with Vishwanathan Anand at no. 11, R Praggnanandhaa at no. 13, Vidit Gujrathi at no. 14, Arjun Erigaisi at no. 17, D Gukesh at no. 25, P Harikrishna at no. 33, S L Narayanan at no. 42, Nihal Sarin at no. 43, Aravindh Chidambaram at no. 73, Raunak Sadhwani at no. 83, and Abhimanyu Puranik at no. 96. That was certainly impressive, but it didn't fully give a glimpse of what was to come up as the year went along.
Let's look at some of the biggest events that shaped Indian Chess in the course of the year.
The Chess Olympiad
The Indian victory in both the open section and the women’s section at the 45th Chess Olympiad in Budapest was nothing short of being spectacular. The event was a truly global one, with more than 180 nations participating and sending their top 5 players for Chess’s most important team event.
In the Open section, D Gukesh, R Praggnanadhaa, Arjun Erigaisi, Vidit Gujrathi and P Harikrishna won the title scoring 21 points out of a total of 22 points from 11 rounds. Second placed USA managed just 17 points, showing the margin of India’s victory. Defending champions Uzbekistan finished third, also with 17 points. Going into the tournament, India was seeded second behind the USA.
Besides team glory, individual glory was also there in abundance. Gukesh won the Gold Medal on the 1st board, scoring 9 points from 10 rounds. His victories included a stunning win over world no. 3, Fabiano Caruana, from USA. Arjun Erigaisi won the Gold Medal on the 3rd board, with a score of 10 points from 11 rounds. At the end of the tournament, Arjun Erigaisi and Gukesh were up to world no. 3 and world no. 5 as per the live ratings (they were ranked world no. 4 and world no. 7 respectively as per the September FIDE ratings before the Olympiad).
In the women’s section, D Harika, R Vaishali, Divya Deshmukh, Vantika Agrawal and Tania Sachdev came first, with 19 points. This was a much closer contest, with Kazakhstan finishing second with 18 points and USA third with 17 points. Divya Deshmukh won the individual Gold Medal on board 3, and Vantika won the individual Gold Medal on board 4.
What was particularly impressive was that both the men’s team and the women’s team were very young, and that bodes very well for the future of Indian Chess. In the open section, Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa and Arjun are 18, 19 and 21 respectively. In the women’s section, Divya, Vantika and Vaishali are 18, 21 and 23 respectively. The other players on the teams also contributed very significantly, with their abundant experience.
Let’s take a quick look at the history of this prestigious tournament. The 1st official Chess Olympiad was held in London in 1927. Since then, it has largely been an event that has taken place once in 2 years, barring disruptions during World War II and the Corona Virus pandemic (when it was held online). The current tournament was the 45th in the series. The Soviet Union won this tournament a staggering 18 times! After the Soviet Union split up, Russia won the Chess Olympiad a further 6 times. In the open category, the statistics for gold medal winners are: Soviet Union – 18, USA – 6, Russia – 6, Hungary – 3, Armenia – 3, Ukraine – 2, China – 2, Yugoslavia- 1, Poland – 1, Germany – 1 and Uzbekistan – 1. India has now joined this elite list. The women’s event began in 1957. The Gold medal winners in 30 editions of this section have been: USSR – 11, China – 6, Georgia – 4, Russia – 3, Hungary -2, Ukraine – 2, Israel – 1, and now India – 1. In the open section, the most successful players of all time have been Tigran Petrosian (Soviet Union) and Vasily Smyslov (Soviet Union), both of whom have won 9 individual Gold medals, followed closely by Garry Kasparov (Soviet Union, then Russia) and Mikhail Tal (Soviet Union), who have both won 8. In the women’s event, the most successful players ever have been Nona Gaprindashvili (Soviet Union, then Georgia), with 11 individual Gold medals, and Maia Chiburdanidze (Soviet Union, then Georgia), who won 9 individual Gold medals.
The World Chess Championship
Gukesh won the right to challenge the World Champion, Ding Liren of China, by winning the Candidates Tournament in Toronto in April 2024. Qualifying for the competitive Candidates Tournament was itself an achievement, and Gukesh succeeded in coming first amongst a field of 8 players, with no fewer than 3 of them being Indians! Gukesh finished the tournament with 9 / 14; Hikaru Nakamura, Ian Nepomniachtchi and Fabiano Caruano got 8 / 14; Praggnanandhaa got 7 / 14; Vidit got 6 / 14; Alireza Firouzja got 5 / 14; and Nijat Abasov got 3.5 / 14.
In December 2024, the much awaited World Championship was held in Singapore, and Gukesh beat Ding Liren 7.5 – 6.5 to become the World Chess Champion. The enormity of the result cannot be stated enough. With the win, Gukesh – aged just 18 – became the youngest ever World Chess Champion, the 18th undisputed World Chess Champion, and the 2nd Indian World Chess Champion after his mentor, the legendary Vishwanathan Anand!
With his victory, Gukesh joins a very short and elite list of World Chess Champions. The World Chess Champions through history have been: 1. Wilhelm Steinitz (1886 – 1894), 2. Emanuel Lasker (1894 – 1921), 3. Jose Raul Capablanca (1921 – 1927), 4. Aleksander Alekhine (1927 – 1935, 1937 – 1946), 5. Max Euwe (1935 – 1937), 6. Mikhail Botvinnik (1948 – 1957, 1958 – 1960, 1961 – 1963), 7. Vasily Smyslov (1957 – 1958), 8. Mikhali Tal (1960 – 1961), 9. Tigran Petrosian (1963 – 1969), 10. Boris Spassky (1969 – 1972), 11. Bobby Fischer (1972 – 1975), 12. Anatoly Karpov (1975 – 1985), 13. Garry Kasparov (1985 – 2000), 14. Vladimir Kramnik (2000 – 2007), 15. Vishwanathan Anand (2007 – 2013), 16. Magnus Carlsen (2013 – 2023), 17. Ding Liren (2023- 2024), 18. D Gukesh (2024 onwards).
Going into the match, Gukesh was the challenger and yet he was the favourite to win the title. Defending champion, Ding Liren had not had a good year at all by his previous exalted standards. Gukesh’s rating was 2,783 and he was no. 5 in the world rankings. In contrast, Ding’s rating was just 2,728 and he was just no. 23 in the world rankings. Despite all this, all experts were sure that it was a folly to write-off Ding, given what a dangerous player he has been over the past few years. Every player goes through a peak and a slump, and neither of these is usually a permanent state. So just going by Ding’s relatively poor record over the past year was not an indication of his deadly potential.
The format of the tournament was such that there were 14 classical games, and in case of a tie, there was going to be a faster format to determine the winner. In the classical format, if either player reached 7.5 points, he would be declared the winner.
Ding started the tournament with a win in Game 1, and that too, with the black pieces. White is generally believed to have a slight advantage because he can decide which opening he wants to play. Gukesh bounced back with a win in Game 3. Then Gukesh won again in Game 11 following a blunder from Ding, but Ding came back strongly in Game 12 to equalize the score at 6 – 6. Game 13 was a draw, so going into Game 14, both players were tied at 6.5 points each. It all came down to the last game. Here Ding had the advantage of the white pieces. As had been the case in most games, both players played with a near perfect accuracy, and as the game went into the endgame, a draw seemed like a foregone conclusion. Then out of the blue, Ding made a blunder that allowed Gukesh to exchange a rook and a bishop, and the resulting endgame had him being up 2 pawns to 1, with a clear victory. Ding immediately saw his mistake and resigned, giving Gukesh the title! It had appeared through the tournament that Ding was quite content with draws in most games, because he knew the odds would be in his favour in the rapid format of the game in case the tournament went down to the wire. Gukesh, on the other hand, gave the impression of trying to push hard for a victory even when there was no clear victory in sight, and his positive approach finally paid off!
There was criticism from greats like Magnus Carlsen (the reigning world no. 1, who refused to defend his World Championship title in 2022, but remains unquestionably the world’s top rated player) and Vladimir Kramnik, who openly said that the quality of games was not befitting of a World Championship. Ding's blunder in Game 14 only strengthened the criticism. There was also a feeling that though both players played incredibly accurately through most of the tournament, their game was a bit mechanical and it was like that of a computer engine. Anand was however very quick to come to Gukesh’s defence and he said criticism comes with the territory, so Gukesh should ignore the criticism. Gukesh won fair and square, after a tremendous year, a win in the highly competitive Candidates Tournament, and then a huge battle in the World Championship itself.
Besides the tournament victory, what endeared Gukesh to a lot of people was his humility. He acknowledged Ding's fighting spirit and praised him generously. He also openly said that just because he was the World Champion, it didn't mean he was the world's best player, because that slot was undeniably occupied by Magnus Carlsen. This showed humility and maturity well beyond his young age! It's so easy for a youngster to taste early success and become arrogant, but there wasn't a trace of that in Gukesh's case.
Other Highlights of the Year
In December 2024 Arjun Erigaisi crossed a FIDE rating of 2,800, becoming just the 15th player in history to do that, with a rating of 2,801. Others to have accomplished this, along with the peak ratings, are: 1. Magnus Carlsen (2,882 in May 2014), 2. Garry Kasparov (2,851 in July 1999), 3. Fabiano Caruana (2,844 in October 2014), 4. Levon Aronian (2,830 in March 2014), 5. Wesley So (2,822 in February 2017), 6. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (2,820 in May 2018), 7. Maxime Vachier Lagrave (2,819 in August 2016), 8. Vishwanathan Anand (2,817 in March 2011), 9. Vladimir Kramnik (2,817 in October 2016), 10. Vaselin Topalov (2,816 in July 2015), 11. Hikaru Nakamura (2,816 in October 2015), 12. Ding Liren (2,816 in November 2018), 13. Alexander Grischuk (2,810 in December 2014), 14. Alireza Firouzja (2,804 in December 2021), 15. Arjun Erigaisi (2,801 in December 2024).
In November 2024, Anish Sarkar of Kolkata became the youngest rated player in history. When his name entered FIDE's list with a rating of 1,555, the boy was just 3 years, 8 month old!
As the year comes to a close, as per the December FIDE world chess ratings, there are 2 Indian players in the Top 5, 3 players in the Top 10, 4 players in the Top 20, 6 players in the Top 30, 8 players in the Top 50, and 11 players in the Top 100! What domination!
The incredible thing to note is that despite Gukesh’s amazing achievement in becoming the World Champion, he’s not even India’s no. 1 player. He’s just behind Arjun Erigaisi in the rankings, with Erigaisi at no. 4 and Gukesh at no. 5, as per the December FIDE ratings. The youth brigade of Gukesh, Erigaisi, Praggnanandhaa and also other emerging stars like Aravindh Chidambaram and Nihal Sarin look poised to dominate world chess for many years to come! For both Gukesh and Erigaisi, the world no. 2 ranking is very much in sight, with world no. 2 Fabiano Caruana and world no. 3 Hikaru Nakamura being just a handful of points ahead of them. It will still take a gargantuan effort for them to catch up with world no. 1 Magnus Carlsen though, but they have age on their side and if their performance in the coming years goes that extra step from where it has been in 2024, the day may not be far when we have an Indian as world no.1, a feat only achieved by Anand in the past!
Vishy's Huge Contribution
A lot of people rightly give the credit of this success to living legend and five-time world champion, Vishwanathan Anand. He became India’s first Chess Grandmaster in 1988, and his success inspired a generation of youngsters to take to the game. India today has no fewer than 85 Grandmasters! Anand not only inspired this set of youngsters to dizzying heights of success, but he mentored them too. He also provided a platform to train some of these players by founding the Anand Westbridge Chess Academy in Chennai – Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa, Erigaisi and Vaishali have all trained in this academy, and are very open in saying how much it helped them in their chess careers. The world acknowledges Anand’s role in supporting these youngsters, and as former World Champion Garry Kasparov put it, “Vishy’s children are all grown up.”
In Conclusion
Even the most optimistic supporters of Indian Chess could not have predicted the laurels that 2024 would bring in. As we approach 2025, our superstars have given us many reasons to look forward to the new year with bated breath, to see what new heights they can achieve! Of course, pressure comes with the territory and in an extremely competitive field like Chess, no success can be taken for granted, but Indian Chess fans are very proud of their achievements and would certainly want to wish them the best of luck for 2025!
