Gukesh, 17, Overtakes Anand In Live Ratings, Becomes India's No.1 Chess Player

Gukesh, 17, overtakes Anand in live ratings, becomes India's No.1 chess player (Image Source: IANS)

GM Misratdin Iskandarov: The 17-year-old Dommaraju Gukesh won two games in his second-round match with GM Misratdin Iskandarov in the first round of the FIDE World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan to surge past Viswanathan Anand in Live Rating and become the highest-ranked Indian chess player in the World.

The win in the first round on Thursday evening against Iskandarov (Elo 2559) helped him rise to 2755.9 in the live rating, taking him past Anand's rating of 2754, making him the second Indian player after Pentala Harikrishna in March 2016 to overtake Anand in live rating as India's No.1 chess player, a position the five-time World Champion has held for 37 years since 1986. Harikrishna was India's No.1 chess player for just one day as Anand won his game the next day and took back the position.

That would be the first time since 1986 that an Indian will overtake Vishy Anand in the 'published' FIDE Rankings. With Anand, rarely playing in the chess circuit for the last few years, there are chances that Gukesh will maintain become India's No.1 player for a long time and maintain that position for many years.

Gukesh, the youngest player to reach the 2750 rating in the World breaking the record held by Magnus Carlsen, will now have to maintain his rating above 2754 when FIDE publishes the rankings next on September 1.

Gukesh, who became the youngest Indian Grandmaster at 12 years, 7 months, 17 days in March 2019 missed becoming the youngest GM in the World and falling short of the record held by Sergey Karjakin by just 17 days. In 2022, Both of them have since been surpassed by an American player of Indian origin Abhimanyu Mishra at the age of 12 years, 4 months, 25 days.

The Chennai-born Gukesh, who made it to the top 100 in the World in April 2022, continued his rapid rise in the rankings and was rated 11th in the World with a rating of 2751 when the Rankings were last published on August 1.

In October 2022, at the age of 16, Gukesh, who is trained by GM Vishnu Prasanna, became the youngest player ever to defeat then-world champion Magnus Carlsen in a game at the Aimchess Rapid Tournament.

Currently, in Live Ratings, Gukesh is ranked 9th in the World with a rating of 2755.9 with Anand (2754) at 10th.