Vishwanathan Anand was recently crowned the undisputed World Chess Champion for winning the title two times consecutively.  But very few remember the days when he was not the Grand Master.  He has come a long way, indeed.

It was way back in 1986 and the event was the Tata Steel and Alekhine Chess Club International Grandmasters’ Chess Tournament held at Calcutta. Anand narrowly missed the GM norm by a mere half point.

In April 1985, the Executive Committee of the club had proposed and decided to hold the highest (Eighth) category (during those days) International Grand Masters Chess tournament. Interestingly Jagmohan Dalmia was the Finance Committee Chairman !

The tournament was approved by FIDE, AICF etc. The main sponsor was TISCO and the Co-Sponsor- Air India

Participants included

• GM Andrew Soltis from USA,
• GM Razuvaev, GM Tseshkovsky and GM Agzamov from USSR,
• GM Y. Jansa from Czechoslovakia,
• GM V.Inkiov from Yugoslavia
• GM norm holder Niaz Murshad from Bangla Desh and
• Seven Indians A.B.Vaidya, Praveen Thipsay, A.B.Meetei, Ravikumar, D.V.Prasad, Dibyendu Barua and Viswanathan Anand

Some highlights from the tournament were

• GM Agzamov won the tournament. He was unbeaten till the end.
• GM norm holder Niaz Murshad became Runner Up and got his GM title from this tourney.
• The most entertaining participant was the oldest Grand Master from Czech Republic -Y.Jansa.
• For GM Soltis, Chess meant enjoyment, entertainment and hobby than a competition.
• The Russian GMs were always serious about the game
• Dibyendu, the local lad could not live up to the expectations
• Anand scored 9 points and missed the GM norm by half a point

I was there to witness the sadness in his face. But the fighter that he was, he did not give up so easily. He soon became India’s youngest Grand Master in less than a year’s time and then there was no looking back.

On 11^th December 2008, the Indian Cricket captain Mahender Singh Dhoni will be falicitating Anand with a Diamond Ring on behalf of the cricketing fraternity and the entire country in Chennai. What a moment that is going to be !

We owe it to Anand to take this lesser known game to international levels and bringing glory to the country.

You are a true world champion, Anand.

We wish you good luck !!!

Image Credit: dlkinney

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Image Credit; Vijitha

At Indiaspecial.net most of us call each other Dada. Dada takes a few turns here and there – Dada becomes Bhai like Hussain Bhai and sometimes Thambi, as in Raman Thambi.

But to us Dada always meant Big Brother.

Talking of Dada, there is only one person who comes to everybody’s mind – none other than the Prince of Kolkata – Sourav Ganguly.  We, the dadas of Indiaspecial.net are certainly fans of Indian cricket and most of all, the real Dada of our times.

This article is a tribute to Sourav Ganguly – The Dada of India who announced his retirement from cricket, today. Apparently, he would bid good bye to international cricket after the Border-Gavaskar trophy series, with Australia this season.

I have a special connection with Dada. I have not spoken to anyone about this till date as I was not sure if it would be taken in the right spirit. But hey ! I couldn’t stop myself coming out – What better time than now.

Here’s the story.

My childhood days were spent in Calcutta. We used to live in a small town called Behala. Dada’s house was just a kilometer away from our house in a place called Chourasta. I used to study in the school called Vivekananda Mission. Since the school was a co-ed, I was pally with many of the girls and one such girl was a sweet hear of mine, those days (Now don’t try to put this into my wife’s ears. She knows it already).

This childhood sweetheart went to the same song and dance institute where Dona Ganguly studied. As the days passed and we got into our early teens, there were many peeping toms who frequented that place to get a glimpse of the future dancing queens and singing sensations of the world.

While I pitched for one of the singing sensations, there was someone else who batted his life for the dancing queen. No prizes for guessing who it was. We met, we talked and we played a couple of games of cricket in this ground called Douglas ground – friendly matches, though. Douglas ground was in an ideal location – a few meters away from Sokher Bazaar and Behala Chourasta.

As the years passed by, I moved out of Calcutta for health reasons, left cricket and lived day dreaming that one day my childhood sweetheart would come to me and we would lead a happy life – That never happened. May be because I was a loser or may be I was destined for someone else – I’d like to believe the latterJ

But one person lived his dream. Sourav da whom I knew as an extremely nice and gentle youngster, went on to become one of India’s greatest cricket captains.

And not just that – he kept his word. He married his childhood sweetheart, a feat very few of us only dream of. And now he planned his exit strategy at the end of the India-Australia series, to exit in style – No wonder people call him The Royal Bengal Tiger and The Prince of Kolkata.  

Hope you have a “Royal Exit”, Dada !

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