Gukesh literally means one who has black hair, no wonder he was not afraid of facing the reigning champion with black pieces in the decider with the challenger and the champion locked with 6.5 points each after 13 gruelling rounds of chess. Anyone who has a even a little knowledge of chess knows that white pieces gives the player an edge, as he is the one who has the initiative. I know some of us may be wondering at this racist rule where white leads the blacks, but black pieces do end up delivering the checkmate in almost 48% of the matches. Anyway, this blog is not about the unfairness of colour discrimination, this one is to celebrate the victory of the youngest world champion, who has made all Indians proud.
Indians are credited to be the ones who invented this game, which was called “Chaturang” in ancient India. Chess was played by the kings, it helped them plan and strategise against their neighbouring states. Premchand’s “Shatranj ke Khiladi” which was later made into a movie by the same name by Satyajit Ray aptly describes how engrossed chess players are that they are not concerned about the British troops marching into Awadh but are ready to draw their swords over minor differences in the game of chess itself. Indian style of Chess was a little different from the international style, here the King was allowed to move like the knight, i.e. two and a half steps once before it was given a check by the opponent. The pawns once they reached the other end of the board, assumed the role of the place where he reached, i.e. if it reached the rook’s place it would be a rook unlike in international version where irrespective of the place, it would be turned into queen. I know many of you may not even be aware of the Indian system at all. When we were growing up and wanted to play, this question was often posed as to which system of Chess would we be keen to indulge in. Incidentally I got hooked to this game rather early, as my father used to play a good game of Chess and his sparring partners range included Professors, Teachers, District Revenue Officers, Clerks and anyone else who could tickle his grey cells. I used to watch them play and picked up the nuances, in fact I even participated in a district tournament once as a seven year old and did win a few rounds.
Those days Bobby Fischer, the maverick American genius who toppled Boris Spassky of the erstwhile USSR as the World Chess Champion was the toast of the Chess fraternity. Unfortunately he remained a recluse and refused to defend his title later ceding the crown back to the Russians as Anatoly Karpov had a pretty long run as the Champ and was subsequently dethroned by compatriot Gary Kasparov. It was Viswanthan Anand who pioneered the Indian renaissance in Chess becoming the first Grandmaster from India and later winning the championship thereby setting the stage for many Chess prodigies in the years to come. Indian Chess Grandmasters did India proud by winning both Open and Women’s Chess Olympiad this year and now of course the crowning glory by Gukesh Dommaraju becoming the youngest World Champion at 18 years. May his tribe rise and we get to witness many a champs in this cerebral field. let us raise a toast to our Cerebral Celebrity.