Indian Chess Champions | ARTE.tv Documentary

[Music] kayam kulam is a village perched on the coast in the very south of India a fishing village where work is challenging and life is hard recently however the region has developed a passion for a game know janaki is 9 years old and her little sister is only five janaki taught thta to play an attempt at the time to improve her attitude foreign fore spee VTA always wins the little girl is reserved but shows strong character as soon as you put her in front of a chessboard her impressive collection of trophies Bears witness to this St [Music] school's Fame is even spreading beyond the borders of Kerala 6 months ago she won the national championship good morning Arby was the first to spot her incredible Talent he now trains her every day first move d4 at the age of five chess is already more than just a game she's carrying her family's hopes on her shoulders hopes that they might be able to rise above their modest circumstances Knight F6 m key very good nf6 best move next class [Music] me bye by [Music] fin OPP financially demanding solu and hopefully [Music] there is a real desire for India to climb its way to the top the Federation has taken this mission in hand across the country hundreds of tournaments are being organized and clubs are flourishing Chennai also in the south of India is one of the leading cities this is the last round last round for the day okay chenai has the most prestigious chess club in the whole country so we here and uh right now we actually seeing around 60 people who are like seriously into chess who love chess probably more than anything competing at the same time socializing also so this is like the one place for chess enthusias in Chennai so I would say that chess culture in Chennai is actually growing rapidly the Chennai chess club has become the country's Champion Factory it all started a few years ago when a local boy became the best Indian player of all time when he started like there was absolutely nothing in ch basically India didn't have an international Master he didn't uh I mean he had some help but uh he didn't have the help of the help like how Russian people did uh he had to like face a lot of what do you say hurdles when to become the undistributed champion this is the legend of the tiger of Madras the nickname given to V Shand in 1988 he became the first Indian to be awarded the title of grandmas and the first to Dethrone the Russians by becoming world champion a basically uh World Championship my best ever result would probably be that one 2008 nine world championship titles the tiger victories have wetted the country's appetite for chess for the government the game has become a means of asserting India's emerging power a lot of countries have a deep respect for chess even if it's not very popular when a chess player arises in a country um then suddenly the country becomes very proud of you know we have the world's best chess player it's still seen as um um a symbol of intelligence and just and Sport even let let's say a lot of the Communist block the Soviet Union but even China to some degree um and it was more profound than we can do chess or we can do sport it was our system gives you the time and freedom to pursue these things uh so that was another thread running through them that's what's happening in India today very aggressive vishy and and opened the way but the movement took on a life of its own no Grandmasters before 1988 but there are 75 as of today shall we sh hand yes it's so we don't have [Music] that so welcome everybody for the last day of the world Blitz championships uh wisha we had so much drama yesterday we had of course fantastic games but um how do you feel about the situation in the tournament so far this tournament for which Vish andand has come to some arand in usbekistan to commentate is the final round of the world Blitz Championship the quickfire version of the game an entire India Armada is present this young generation is turning the chess world upside down among the Juniors there are five Indian players in the worldwide top 10 gukesh domaru is number three recently the the booming Indian uh chesses so great to watch and and already uh there are three players on the candidates from India this year in 2024 so I don't think other than Russia anyone any country has had three players in the candidate I might be wrong but yeah it's already uh a great achievement I would say in the future I we hope that uh we can take it even further India will become super super power in the world rankings by country India has overtaken Russia and China only the United States remains at the top world champion Magnus Carlson is up against an Indian player he is holding on but is under [Music] threat this young man prag short for pragnan Ander Ramesh Babu beat him in February 2022 he was only 16 years old old prag is now number 13 in the world and on his way to becoming a national [Music] hero tonight the hero is accompanied by his mother and sister the cameras are focused on this family like no other there's pra but also his elder sister V she too is a chess Grandmaster I think this the first time uh brother sister do uh qualified to candidates also become Grandmaster um and yeah it's obviously we very happy and um it's true that um my parents don't don't know about chair much about chair before uh we actually started to um play tournament seriously and yeah still they don't know the rules but they know who are the players and what's going on and honestly I didn't this even prag will be awarded the trophy for Rising sports star of the Year vishy Anand prague's role model received the same award a few years ago yeah they Haven removed that so how does it feel vishi that your prodig is winning the same award that you won I think about 10 years ago it's very nice you really feel that the tradition is being carried on and uh uh that uh prug is doing it uh really feels like a baton being passed so yes I'm I'm very happy about that at 10 years 10 months and 19 days old prag became the youngest International Grandmaster in the game's history the son of a stay-at-home mom and a smallscale office worker has risen to the very top he now inspires players Nationwide young people from Modest backgrounds like [Music] himself in Kerala Thea is still struggling to talk to us about her dreams but her father wants to believe that all his sacrifices will secure his daughter's future in a few years the could be India's great Champion she will then have to carry the hopes of her family and also of an entire country that is occupying an increasingly important place on the world [Music] [Music] stage e

Channel: ARTE.tv Documentary

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Keywords: ARTE, TV, documentary, arte.tv documentary, free documentary, arte tv, documentaries, arte english, full documentary, arte.tv english, @artetvdocumentary, documentary 2023, Indian Chess Champions, india, indian chess, chess in india, chess champions, chess india, chess champions india, International Chess Federation, chess documentary, chess documentary india, indian chess players, chess players india

Id: fjgstOXHss0

Length: 13min 17sec (797 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 13 2024