Neither current World Champion D Gukesh nor former world champion Vishy Anand are the top rated Indian chess player.
Five Indian Grandmasters including the current and former world champion figure in the top 25 places in the chess world.
Interestingly, neither the current World Champion GM D Gukesh nor former world champion Viswanathan Anand is the top rated Indian chess player.
GM R Praggnanandhaa with a rating of 2,779 ELO points is the top rated Indian player, Pragg occupies the fourth position on the global pecking list, as per the International Chess Federation or FIDE.
The fifth and sixth positions are occupied by GMs Arjun Erigaisi and Gukesh. Anand is ranked 13th with 2,743 points. GM V R Aravindh Chithambaram is ranked 24th.
Former world champion GM Magnus Carlsen (2,839 points) continues to be the top most rated player followed by the two American GMs, Hikaru Nakamura (2,807 points) and Fabiano Caruana (2,784 points).
1969 born Anand is the oldest player in the top 25.
Many of Anand's peers are nowhere near the top 25.
1968 born Israeli GM Boris Gelfand is ranked 73rd with 2,652 points and 1969 born Ukranian GM Vasyl Ivanchuk is ranked 87th with a rating of 2,641.
Anand, who was known as the lighting kid during his school days for making fast moves, continues to be so at the global level.
In the rapid and blitz chess categories Anand ranks 11th and 18th respectively.
Ivanchuk and Gelfand are ranked 70th and 78th respectively in the rapid section.
In the blitz section Ivanchuk is ranked 59th .
In the juniors category there are nine Indian GMs including Gukesh and Praggnanandhaa in the top 25.
The other seven Indian masters are: Raunak Sadhwani (4th, 2,681 points), Leon Luke Mendonca (14th, 2,603 points), V Pranav (17th, 2,594 points), M Pranesh (18th, 2,592 points), Aditya Mittal (21st, 2,570 points), Pranav Anand (24th, 2,566 points) and H.Bharath Subramaniyam (25th,2,561 points).
In the women's category four Indian players are in the top 25 list: GMs Koneru Humpy (5th rank, 2,536 points), D Harika (12th rank, 2,488 points), R Vaishali (15th rank, 2,478 points) and International Master Divya Deshmukh (18th rank, 2,463 points).
In the girls junior section, Divya is on top. The other Indian players in the first 25 rank are: IM B Savitha Shri (10th, 2,341 points), Woman GM Rakshitta Ravi (15th, 2,329 points), WIM G Tejaswani (20th, 2,307 points), WIM V Sarayu (23rd, 2,290 points).
Venkatachari Jagannathan can be reached at venkatacharijagannathan@gmail.com
Feature Presentation: Ashish Narsale/Rediff
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