Viswanathan Anand says quality of competition too high in India

MUMBAI: World rapid chess champion Viswanathan Anand is extremely satisfied with the huge steps Indian chess players have taken. However, he feels that it is not good for a budding chess player to be born in the country.
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"The competition has become so high that it is extremely difficult for a budding player to achieve a victory here and I would like to say that it is not good to be born in India today if one wishes to pursue chess as a career," said the five-time world champion on the sidelines of the launch of Fincare Small Finance Bank in the city on Wednesday.However, he says he is happy to be the face of chess in India. "I'm happy to be the catalyst of change. I was the first Grand Master and now we have 52," he added.
Recalling his childhood days, Anand said that when he started playing chess in Chennai as a six-year-old, it was difficult for him to get access to any coaching or material. "I certainly would have liked to be born in Moscow because that was the hub of world chess then. Though my mother taught me the basics of the sport, I was lucky that there was a club opposite my sister's college. I enrolled there and could get some stronger opponents to play against," said the 48-year-old.
When asked about why he is still a few notches above the other top India players despite the fact that players like P Harikrshna, Vidit Gujarathi and Sashikiran have been around for a long time. Anand said: "There are two groups. In one there are few who are beyond 2800 (elo rating points) and above and are ranked in the top five. That is a special group where ranking doesn't change so fast. Then there are about 30 in the second group which has players between the range of 2795 to 2750 points. The ranking changes very fast in this group. Now I am also back in the second group and am fighting to get back in the top group again. You have to keep adapting to new changes, methods and keep track of the latest developments to remain in the top group," Anand observed.
He felt that Indian players are preparing well for the 43rd Chess Olympiad to be held in Batumi, Georgia from September 23 to October 6 later this year. "I think our performance in the last two editions was as good as you can get, given the fact that there were so many strong teams. It makes no sense when we say we will try to achieve this or that. I would say we will try to do our best. You can play a very good Olympiad and yet finish last."
Talking about a small planet which is in the orbit between Jupiter and Mars and is named after him as 4538visyanaand, in 2015, Anand said: "I could really not study about it as it is such a small planet which is actually an asteroid. It is so tiny that it is difficult to study in detail but I feel extremely honoured that it was named after me," said the champion who is also an ardent astronomy lover.