Gukesh at the summit: What does it mean for Indian chess now?

There are some defining moments in Indian sporting folklore which stays with you for ever. A beaming Kapil Dev holding aloft the World Cup trophy at the Lord’s balcony, a stoical Abhinav Bindra after his gold in Beijing 2008 or Neeraj Chopra with the tricolour on the podium at Tokyo Olympics. Now, add the normally inscrutable D. Gukesh breaking into tears of joy after becoming the youngest world champion in classical chess at the Resorts World Sentosa, Singapore.

It’s no surprise that the 18-year-old has become the toast of the global chess fraternity as he put the jewel in the crown for what had been an exceptional last year-and-a-half for Indian chess. If it was R. Praggnanandhaa who set the ball rolling by finishing runner-up to Magnus Carlsen in the Chess World Cup in 2023 and becoming the only second Indian to qualify for the Candidates series after Vishy Anand, his peer Gukesh stole the thunder by winning the Candidates to emerge as the challenger for the world crown. The rest, as they say, was history.

This August, the Indian men's and women’s teams made history when they claimed a ‘double’ in the Chess Olympiad in Budapest – underlining in no uncertain terms the birth of a new chess superpower this millennium. Anand, the five-time world champion and a mentor of this youth brigade, put things in perspective about the significance of Gukesh’s triumph: ‘’We now have a generation of players. Even Gukesh, having become world champion at the age of 18, has the best part of his career ahead of him. This entire generation of players – Gukesh, Arjun [Erigaisi], Pragg [R Praggnanandhaa] – the sport is very strong at the moment, and I am pleased that not just personally, but also through the Westbridge Anand Chess Academy, I have had a role to play in it.’’

It’s an objective assessment from the man who has been there and done that. Just ponder this: if all goes well, Gukesh could be heading for an all-Indian battle for his title defence as compatriot Arjun Erigaisi has raised the bar to menacing proportions. Now 21, the unassuming player from Warangal district in Andhra Pradesh has gone past 2800 ELO and winning tournaments consistently, could step up in a big way in 2025. No prizes for guessing, there is a healthy rivalry brewing among these uber-talented players – and this can be only good news for Indian chess.

It's presumptuous to say that the winds of change are blowing in Indian sport – but history says that a country certainly needs achievers for any particular discipline to spark interest among the youth.  Anand had been ploughing a lonely furrow for over last three decades, even though he had to surrender the world crown to the genius of Magnus Carlsen in Chennai in 2013.

Interestingly, while Chennai’s biggest sporting icon had to let go his world crown, the Tamil Nadu government commenced a ‘Seven to 17’ programme for the schools to make chess a part of the curriculum. The move started yielding incredible results with the Velammal Vidyalaya in the western suburubs of the city turning into a major chess hub with two of their brighest alumni in world champion Gukesh and Prag – not to speak of the dozens of other Grandmasters from the school.

There are 85 GMs in India as of May this year with M. Shayaamnikhil becoming the last one after a long, 12-year wait. While Anand was the first one to take that big leap in 1987, there were only three of them (Dibyendu Barua & Pravin Thipsay being the other two) till the new millennium ushered in a steady trickle of the GMs. The last four years have seen 20-odd Grandmasters being added to the list – with the southern part of the country still producing the bulk and the likes of Maharashtra, West Bengal, Odisha and Delhi accounting for the rest.

This is an imbalance which needs to be addressed if chess has to ride the crest of wave on Gukesh’s triumph. There are, however, the likes of a wonderkid Anish Sarkar who was the cynosure of all eyes at the Tata Steel Open Chess last month. At three years and nine months, Anish had been turning heads with a debut rating of 1555 points – a feat which Carlsen found was exceptional.

 All in all, it's a great time to be a follower of Indian chess. As Anand says: ‘’Gukesh’s win will go a long way for chess in India.’’