Pune to host world jr chess in October

Pune will host the World Junior Chess Championship from October 5. A total of 250 players from 65 countries, have confirmed their entries for the 15- day event. Entries close on September 5 for the Under- 20 tournament.

Vishwanathan Anand will be the event’s brand ambassador. Maharashtra chief minister Prithrivaj Chavan will be the patron of the tournament, according to organisers Maharashtra Chess Association and its Pune affiliate.

“This tournament identifies future champions. Players like Boris Spassky, Anatoly Karpov, Kasparov and myself had won the world juniors before going on to win the world championship ( seniors) title,” he said at the launch here.

“The event will see a very strong field of players and will be very competitive. Pune is one of the chess centres in India. Lot of activities happen there and youngsters will benefit.”

Besides Anand, P. Harikrishna, Abhijeet Gupta, Koneru Humpy, Dronavalli Harika and Soumya Swaminathan are the other Indians who have won WJCC titles in the past.

The tournament will be played in the open category and the girls category in the Swiss League format comprising 13 rounds. The winner in both classes will be conferred the title of Grandmaster and Woman Grandmaster and will automatically qualify for the upcoming World Cup. The winners will take home a cash prize of ` 6 lakhs.

The highest- rated player in the open category, which will see 51 participants is Wei Yi of China and Robin van Kampen of Holland — both with an identical rating of 2638 — while the lowest is New Zelander Raivath Mallela ( 1059) and the average ELO rating is 2300.