It was one of the most dominant performances in the history of chess. And it came from India’s golden generation, which delivered two gold medals at the Chess Olympiad in Budapest. Beside the team medals, there were also four individual gold with D Gukesh, Arjun Erigaisi, Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal claiming individual honours.
The Indian men’s team in the open section was so breathtakingly formidable that in 44 games, they lost just once, winning 27 and drawing the remaining. They capped the event by brushing aside Slovenia with three wins and a draw.
The Indian women’s team also raced across the finish line by winning three games and drawing one against Azerbaijan. An indicator of Indian chess’ depth can be gauged by the fact that India’s top-ranked women’s player Koneru Humpy chose to sit out the Olympiad and the team still won gold.
For the individual honours, Gukesh and Erigaisi, who played on board 1 and 3 respectively, walked away with the top honours. In the women’s category, Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal, who featured on board 3 and 4 respectively, were the best players.
The victorious Indian team at the 2024 Chess olympiad. (FIDE)
“It feels like a magical time for India,” five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand told FIDE’s YouTube channel on Saturday, after the men’s team had more or less secured their gold medal with the Indian women’s team in with a chance to claim the top prize themselves. “This is unbelievable. The Indian men’s team is so dominant! For the second successive Olympiad, both our teams are fighting for gold. This exceeds my expectations. It’s a very talented group of youngsters. With such players, you know you will have a certain amount of results but they consistently exceed it.”
“This team will stay on top for years to come, and India is now officially the best chess nation in the world!” declared the legendary Susan Polgar, a former women’s world champion, on X.
This has been the greatest year for Indian chess already, and 18-year-old Gukesh could well cap it off by becoming the youngest world champion in history. He is already world no 5 while Arjun rose to world no 3 in the live rating, which is updated in real time.
In 2024, the milestones for Indian chess include three Indians making the cut for the elite Candidates tournament for the first time, besides two women competing in the Women’s Candidates competition. From these five players, Gukesh (then 17) became the youngest-ever to win the event. The year also saw R Praggnanandhaa taking down world no 1 Magnus Carlsen for the first time in the classical format at the Norway Chess tournament. India are currently represented in the top 5 ranking spots by Arjun, who did not even secure a spot at the Candidates event, showcasing the depth in Indian chess at the moment.
Harika Dronavalli reacts after securing her win in Round 11 of the Chess Olympiad. (PHOTO: FIDE / Michal Walusza)
But while most of these feats were indicators of individual prowess, securing two team gold medals at the Olympiad is a sign that the nation is now a chess superpower.
“I could see there was a lot of personal motivation for each player. I could feel that for all five players, the idea of playing for India and winning gold was something that motivated them. This gold means a lot because we had never won gold at an offline Olympiad. You can have a lot of trophies but the Olympiad gold is special. It establishes your dominance as a team and as a country. There’s no question (that India is now a chess superpower),” Indian team captain Srinath Narayanan told The Indian Express.
Winning a team gold will remain special, especially after India was in line to win it in 2022, but faltered in the last few steps to settle for bronze. That heartbreak was most intensely felt by Gukesh, who had blundered in the game against Uzbekistan which cost India the chance to win gold, after having the best tournament of his career until that point.
“This tournament (meant a lot) for me, especially since what happened last time when we were so close as a team to win gold. This time I thought no matter what, I’m going to do whatever it takes to win the team gold. I did not think about individual gold much. I just wanted to win the gold for the team,” Gukesh told chess.com after winning his match on Sunday.
IM Vantika Agrawal takes on grandmaster Bella Khotenashvilli of Georgia to lead India to victory in round 7 of the Chess Olympiad. (PHOTO: Michal Walusza/FIDE)
Winning twin gold medals has the potential to propel the sport even further now.
“This is a 1983 moment for Indian chess,” says Sameer Pathak, CEO of the Global Chess League, drawing a comparison between the twin Olympiad gold medals and the country winning its first Cricket World Cup. “1983 started the commercial revolution for Indian cricket. The rise of India as chess’ engine is already clear.”
Pathak points out that India’s performance at the Online Chess Olympiad in 2020 was the reason why the multi-million-dollar Global Chess League (GCL) was launched in the first place.
“In the 2020 Online Olympiad, when India won the joint gold medal, (business tycoon) Anand Mahindra was watching. That’s how the Global Chess League got launched. And now this win shows that chess is not just about one Indian player, there is Gukesh, there is Praggnanandhaa, there is Arjun. This is a whole generation of stars,” says Pathak.
