Viswanathan Anand

Viswanathan Anand
Full name	Viswanathan Anand
Country	India
Born	11 December 1969 (1969-12-11) (age 41) Mayiladuthurai, Tamil Nadu, India
Title	Grandmaster (1988)
World Champion	2000–02 (FIDE) 2007–present (undisputed)
FIDE rating	2817 (No. 2 in the September 2011 FIDE World Rankings)
Peak rating	2817 (May 2011)

V. Anand or Anand Viswanathan, usually referred as Viswanathan Anand, (Tamil: விசுவநாதன் ஆனந்த், IPA: [ʋiʃʋəˈn̪aːt̪ən ˈaːnən̪d̪]; born 11 December 1969) is an Indian chess Grandmaster, the current World Chess Champion, and currently second highest rated player in the world.

He held the FIDE World Chess Championship from 2000 to 2002, at a time when the world title was split. He became the undisputed World Champion in 2007 and defended his title against Vladimir Kramnik in 2008. He then successfully defended his title in the World Chess Championship 2010 against Veselin Topalov. As the reigning champion, he will face Boris Gelfand, the winner of the Candidates Tournament, for the World Chess Championship 2012.

Anand is one of six players in history to break the 2800 mark on the FIDE rating list, and in April 2007 at the age of 37, he became the world number one for the first time. He was at the top of the world rankings five out of six times, from April 2007 to July 2008, holding the number-one ranking for a total of 15 months. In October 2008, he dropped out of the world top three ranking for the first time since July 1996. Anand officially regained the world number one ranking on November 1, 2010, after having defeated the reigning world No. 1 Magnus Carlsen in the Bilbao Masters.

Anand became India's first grandmaster in 1987.^[1] He was also the first recipient of the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award in 1991–92, India's highest sporting honor. In 2007, he was awarded India's second highest civilian award, the Padma Vibhushan, making him the first sportsperson to receive the award in Indian history.

Anand has been described by Lubomir Kavalek as the most versatile world champion ever, since Anand is the only player to have won the world chess championships in many formats including Knockout, Tournament, Match, Rapid, and Blitz.^[2]

In an August 31, 2011 interview with Vlad Tkachiev, Vladimir Kramnik (ex-World Champion 2000 to 2006) said that "I always considered him to be a colossal talent, one of the greatest in the whole history of chess", "I think that in terms of play Anand is in no way weaker than Kasparov", and "In the last 5-6 years he’s made a qualitative leap that’s made it possible to consider him one of the greatest chess players".^[3]

[edit] Personal life

Anand was born on 11 December 1969 in Mayiladuthurai, a small town in Tamil Nadu, India in a Tamil family. Shortly thereafter, his family moved to Chennai, erstwhile Madras, where he grew up.^[4] His father, Viswanathan Iyer, is a retired General Manager of Southern Railways, and his mother Susheela, housewife and chess/film/club aficionado and an influential socialite. He has an elder brother, Shivakumar who is a manager at Crompton Greaves in India and an elder sister Anuradha who is a lecturer at the University of Michigan.^[5][6] Anand is 11 years younger than his sister and 13 years younger than his brother.

He was taught to play chess by his mother. He described his start in chess in a conversation with Susan Polgar:

I started when I was six. My mother taught me how to play. In fact, my mother used to do a lot for my chess. We moved to the Philippines shortly afterward. I joined the club in India and we moved to the Philippines for a year. And there they had a TV program that was on in the afternoon, one to two or something like that, when I was in school. So she would write down all the games that they showed and the puzzles, and in the evening we solved them together.

Of course my mother and her family used to play some chess, and she used to play with her younger brother, so she had some background in chess, but she never went to a club or anything like that.

So we solved all these puzzles and sent in our answers together. And they gave the prize of a book to the winner. And over the course of many months, I won so many prizes. At one point they just said take all the books you want, but don't send in any more entries.^[7]

Anand did his schooling in Don Bosco Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Egmore, Chennai and holds a degree in commerce from Loyola College, Chennai. His hobbies are reading, swimming, and listening to music. He is married to Aruna Anand and has a son born on April 9, 2011.^[8] Anand's son is named Akhil and in the south Indian tradition will be called "Anand Akhil" (no surname). The family is now based in Chennai, India.^[9][10]

In August 2010, Anand joined the Board of Directors of Olympic Gold Quest, a foundation for promoting and supporting India's elite sportspersons and potential young talent.^[11][12][13] On 24 December 2010 Anand was guest of honor on the grounds of Gujarat university, Ahmedabad, where 20,486 players created a new world record of simultaneous chess play at single venue.^[14]

[edit] Chess career

[edit] Early career

Anand's rise in the Indian chess world was meteoric. National level success came early for him when he won the National Sub-Junior Chess Championship with a score of 9/9 in 1983 at the age of fourteen. He became the youngest Indian to win the title of International Master at the age of fifteen, in 1984. At the age of sixteen he became the national chess champion and won that title two more times. He played games at blitz speed. In 1987, he became the first Indian to win the World Junior Chess Championship. In 1988, at the age of eighteen, he became India's first Grandmaster by winning Shakti Finance International chess tournament held in Coimbatore, India. He was awarded Padma Shri at the age of 18.

Anand at the Manila 1992 Olympiad, age 22

"Vishy", as he is sometimes called by his friends, burst upon the upper echelons of the chess scene in the early 1990s, winning such tournaments as Reggio Emilia 1991 (ahead of Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov). Playing at such a high level did not slow him down, and he continued to play games at blitz speed.

In the World Chess Championship 1993 cycle Anand qualified for his first Candidates Tournament, winning his first match but narrowly losing his quarter-final match to Anatoly Karpov.^[15]

In 1994–95 Anand and Gata Kamsky dominated the qualifying cycles for the rival FIDE and PCA world championships. In the FIDE cycle (FIDE World Chess Championship 1996), Anand lost his quarter-final match to Kamsky after leading early.^[16] Kamsky went on to lose the 1996 FIDE championship match against Karpov.

In the 1995 PCA cycle, Anand won matches against Oleg Romanishin and Michael Adams without a loss, then avenged his FIDE loss by defeating Gata Kamsky in the Candidates final.^[17] In 1995, he played the PCA World Chess Championship 1995 against Kasparov in New York City's World Trade Center. After an opening run of eight draws (a record for the opening of a world championship match), Anand won game nine with a powerful exchange sacrifice, but then lost four of the next five. He lost the match 10½–7½.

In the 1998 FIDE cycle, the reigning champion Karpov was granted direct seeding by FIDE into the final against the winner of the seven-round single elimination Candidates tournament. The psychological and physical advantage gained by Karpov from this decision caused significant controversy, leading to the withdrawal of future World Champion Vladimir Kramnik from the candidates tournament. Anand won the candidates tournament, defeating Michael Adams in the final, and immediately faced a well-rested Karpov for the championship. Despite this tremendous disadvantage for Anand, which he described as being "brought in a coffin" to play Karpov,^[18] Anand was able to draw the regular match 3-3, forcing a rapid playoff. However, the rapid playoff was won 2-0 by Karpov, allowing him to defend his FIDE championship.

[edit] World Chess Champion

[edit] FIDE World Chess Champion 2000

After several near misses, Anand won the FIDE World Chess Championship in 2000 for the first time after defeating Alexei Shirov 3½–0½ in the final match held at Tehran, thereby becoming the first Indian to win that title.

He failed to defend the title in 2002, losing in the semifinals to Vassily Ivanchuk. The 2002 FIDE world championship was ultimately won by Ruslan Ponomariov. Anand tied for second with Peter Svidler in the FIDE World Chess Championship 2005 with 8½ points out of 14 games, 1½ points behind the winner, Veselin Topalov.

[edit] World Chess Champion 2007

In September 2007 Anand became World Champion again by winning that year's FIDE World Championship Tournament held in Mexico City. He won the double round-robin tournament with a final score of 9 out of 14 points, a full point ahead of joint second place finishers Vladimir Kramnik and Boris Gelfand.

In 2000, when Anand won the FIDE World Championship, there was also the rival "Classical" World Championship, held by Kramnik. By 2007, the world championship had been reunified, so Anand's victory in Mexico City made him undisputed World Chess Champion. He became the first undisputed champion to win the title in a tournament, rather than in matchplay, since Mikhail Botvinnik in 1948.

In October 2007, Anand said he liked the double round robin championship format (as used in the 2007 championship in Mexico City), and that the right of Kramnik to automatically challenge for the title was "ridiculous".^[19]

[edit] World Chess Champion 2008

This section uses algebraic notation to describe chess moves.

Anand convincingly defended the title against Kramnik in the World Chess Championship 2008 held between 14–29 October in Bonn, Germany. The winner was to be the first to score 6½ points in the twelve-game match.^[20] Anand won by scoring 6½ points in 11 games, having won three of the first six games (two with the black pieces).^[21] After the tenth game, Anand led 6–4 and needed only a draw in either of the last two games to win the match. In the eleventh game, Kramnik played the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian Defense. Once the players traded queens, Kramnik offered a draw after 24 moves since he had no winning chances in the endgame.^[22]

Anand vs. Kramnik, 2008 World Championship

	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h
8									8
7									7
6									6
5									5
4									4
3									3
2									2
1									1
	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h

Final position of the match

Final Game
Anand (2783) – Kramnik (2772), Wch Bonn GER (11), 29.10.2008:
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 e6 7.f4 Qc7 8.Bxf6 gxf6 9.f5 Qc5 10.Qd3 Nc6 11.Nb3 Qe5 12.0–0–0 exf5 13.Qe3 Bg7 14.Rd5 Qe7 15.Qg3 Rg8 16.Qf4 fxe4 17.Nxe4 f5 18.Nxd6+ Kf8 19.Nxc8 Rxc8 20.Kb1 Qe1+ 21.Nc1 Ne7 22.Qd2 Qxd2 23.Rxd2 Bh6 24.Rf2 Be3 ½–½^[23]

On his winning the championship his mother—and his first coach—said "To me, it was like the first chess match he won in a school tournament. It's just the same, only the degree has changed."^[24]

Responding to Anand's win, Garry Kasparov said "A great result for Anand and for chess. Vishy deserved the win in every way and I'm very happy for him. It will not be easy for the younger generation to push him aside... Anand out-prepared Kramnik completely. In this way it reminded me of my match with Kramnik in London 2000. Like I was then, Kramnik may have been very well prepared for this match, but we never saw it."^[25] In 2010 Anand donated his gold medal to the charitable organisation "The Foundation" to be auctioned off for the benefit of underprivileged children.^[26]

[edit] World Chess Champion 2010

Prior to the World Chess Championship 2010 match with Veselin Topalov, Anand, who had booked on the flight Frankfurt-Sofia on April 16, was stranded due to the cancellation of all flights following the volcano ash cloud from Eyjafjallajökull. Anand asked for a three day postponement, which the Bulgarian organisers refused on April 19. Anand eventually reached Sofia on April 20, after an exhausting 40-hour road journey.^[27] Consequently, the first game was delayed by one day.^[28]

The match consisted of 12 games. After 11 games the score was tied at 5½-5½. Anand won game 12 on the Black side of a Queen's Gambit Declined to win the match and retain the World Championship. In game 12, after Topalov's dubious 31st and 32nd moves, Anand was able to achieve a strong attack against Topalov's relatively exposed king. Topalov subsequently resigned.

[edit] World Chess Championship 2012

As a result of Anand's victory in the World Chess Championship 2010, he will defend his title in the World Chess Championship 2012; the location of the event is Moscow. His opponent will be Boris Gelfand, the winner of the 2011 Candidates Matches. Boris Gelfand won the final match of Candidates Matches against Alexander Grischuk of Russia. This will be the first time Anand would play against someone older to him when he defends his world championship title.^[29]

[edit] FIDE World Rapid Chess Champion 2003

In October 2003, the governing body of chess, FIDE, organized a rapid time control tournament in Cap d'Agde^[30][31] and billed it as the World Rapid Chess Championship. Each player had 25 minutes at the start of the game, with an additional ten seconds after each move. Anand won this event ahead of ten of the other top twelve players in the world, beating Kramnik in the final. His main recent titles in this category are at: Corsica (six years in a row from 1999 through 2005), Chess Classic (nine years in a row from 2000 through 2008), Leon 2005, Eurotel 2002, Fujitsu Giants 2002 and the Melody Amber (five times, and he won the rapid portion of Melody Amber seven times). In the Melody Amber 2007, Anand did not lose a single game in the rapid section, and scored 8½ /11, two more than the runners-up, for a performance in the rapid section of 2939.^[32] In most tournament time control games that Anand plays, he has more time left than his opponent at the end of the game. He lost on time in one game, to Gata Kamsky. Otherwise, he took advantage of the rule allowing players in time trouble to use dashes instead of the move notation during the last four minutes only once, in the game Anand versus Svidler at the MTel Masters 2006.^[33]

[edit] Other results

Anand won three consecutive Advanced Chess tournaments in Leon, Spain, after Garry Kasparov introduced this form of chess in 1998, and is widely recognized as the world's best Advanced Chess player, where humans may consult a computer to aid in their calculation of variations.

Anand has won the Chess Oscar in 1997, 1998, 2003, 2004, 2007 and 2008. The Chess Oscar is awarded to the year's best player according to a worldwide poll of leading chess critics, writers, and journalists conducted by the Russian chess magazine 64.

His game collection, My Best Games of Chess, was published in the year 1998 and was updated in 2001.

Anand's recent tournament successes include the Corus chess tournament in 2006 (tied with Veselin Topalov), Dortmund in 2004, and Linares in 2007 and 2008. He has won the annual event Monaco Amber Blindfold and Rapid Chess Championships in years 1994, 1997, 2003, 2005 and 2006. He is the only player to have won five titles of the Corus chess tournament. He is also the only player to win the blind and rapid sections of the Amber tournament in the same year (twice: in 1997 and 2005). He is the first player to have achieved victories in each of the three big chess supertournaments: Corus (1989, 1998, 2003, 2004, 2006), Linares (1998, 2007, 2008), Dortmund (1996, 2000, 2004).

In 2007 he won the Grenkeleasing Rapid championship, which he won for the tenth time defeating Armenian GM Levon Aronian. Incidentally, just a few days before Aronian had defeated Anand in the Chess960 final.

In March 2007, Anand won the Linares chess tournament and it was widely believed that he would be ranked world No.1 in the FIDE Elo rating list for April 2007. However, Anand was placed No.2 in the initial list released because the Linares result was not included. FIDE subsequently announced that the Linares results would be included after all,^[34] making Anand number one in the April 2007 list.^[35]

Anand won the Mainz 2008 Supertournament Championship by defeating rising star Magnus Carlsen, earning his eleventh title in that event.^[36]

[edit] Rating

In the April 2007 FIDE Elo rating list, Anand was ranked first in the world for the first time,^[37] and (as of July 2008^[update]) he held the number one spot in all ratings lists but one since then until July 2008, the exception being the January 2008 list, where he was rated No. 2 behind Vladimir Kramnik (equal rating, but Kramnik held the No. 1 spot due to more games played).^[38] He dropped to No. 5 in the October 2008 list, the first time he had been outside the top 3 since July 1996.^[39]

In 2010, Anand announced that he would expand his tournament schedule, beginning in late 2010, in an effort to regain the world number one ranking from Magnus Carlsen.^[40][41] He achieved that goal on November 1, 2010 list with a rating of 2804, two points ahead of Magnus Carlsen.^[42]

[edit] Personality

Anand has been viewed as an unassuming, benevolent person with a reputation of refraining from political and psychological ploys as much as possible in order to focus solely on the chessboard.^[18] This has made him a well-liked figure throughout the chess world for two decades, evidenced by the fact that Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik, and Magnus Carlsen, all rivals for the World Championship throughout Anand's career, each aided him in preparing for the World Chess Championship 2010.^[43][44] Anand is sometimes known as the "Tiger of Madras".^[45] Anand was the only sportsperson to have been invited for the very exclusive dinner that Indian PM Dr Manmohan Singh hosted for US President Barack Obama on November 7, 2010 [2]

[edit] Controversies

Anand was denied an honorary doctorate from University of Hyderabad because of confusion over his citizenship status, however later Kapil Sibal, Minister of Human Resource Development apologised and said "There is no issue on the matter as Anand has agreed to accept the degree at a convenient time depending on his availability".^[46] According to The Hindu Anand finally refused to accept the doctorate.

[edit] Notable tournament victories

[edit] Awards

Anand has received many national and international awards.

• Arjuna award for Outstanding Indian Sportsman in Chess in 1985
• Padma Shri, National Citizens Award and Soviet Land Nehru Award in 1987
• The inaugural Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award, India's highest sporting honour in the year 1991–1992.
• British Chess Federation 'Book of the Year' Award in 1998 for his book My Best Games of Chess
• Padma Bhushan in 2000
• Jameo de Oro the highest honour given by the Government of Lanzarote in Spain on 25 April 2001. The award is given to illustrious personalities with extraordinary achievements.
• Chess Oscar (1997, 1998, 2003, 2004, 2007, and 2008)
• Sportstar Millennium Award in 1998, from India's premier Sports magazine for being the sportperson of the millennium
• Padma Vibhushan in 2007
• 'Global Strategist Award' for Mastering many formats of World Chess Championships by NASSCOM in 2011.^[47]

[edit] Sample game

Anand vs. Bologan, 2000 World Championship

	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h
8									8
7									7
6									6
5									5
4									4
3									3
2									2
1									1
	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h

Position after move 36. Anand (White), in an apparently worse position, finds an intuitive sacrifice that leads to a winning attack.

This section uses algebraic notation to describe chess moves.

On his way to winning the FIDE World Chess Championship in 2000, Anand (White) defeated Grandmaster Viktor Bologan (Black). Here are the moves (analysis by Grandmaster Ľubomír Ftáčnik):

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 Nf6 5. O-O Be7 6. Re1 b5 7. Bb3 d6 8. c3 O-O 9. h3 Nb8 10. d4 Nbd7 11. Nbd2 Bb7 12. Bc2 Re8 13. Nf1 Bf8 14. Ng3 c5 15. d5 c4 16. Bg5 Qc7 17. Nf5 Kh8 18. g4 Ng8 19. Qd2 Nc5 20. Be3 Bc8 21. Ng3 Rb8 22. Kg2 a5 23. a3 Ne7 24. Rh1 Ng6 25. g5! b4!?

Anand has an excellent kingside attack, so Bologan seeks counterplay with the sacrifice of a pawn.

26. axb4 axb4 27. cxb4 Na6 28. Ra4 Nf4+ 29. Bxf4 exf4 30. Nh5 Qb6 31. Qxf4 Nxb4 32. Bb1 Rb7 33. Ra3 Rc7 34. Rd1 Na6 35. Nd4 Qxb2 36. Rg3 c3 (see diagram) 37. Nf6!! Re5

If 37...gxf6, 38. gxf6 h6 39. Rg1! Qd2! 40. Qh4 leaves White with an irresistible initiative.

38. g6! fxg6 39. Nd7 Be7 40. Nxe5 dxe5 41. Qf7 h6 42. Qe8+ 1–0^[48]

White forces mate in 12 moves if the game were to continue, with 42... Bf8 43. Rf3 Qa3 44. Rxf8+ Qxf8 45. Qxf8+ Kh7 46. d6 exd4 47. Ba2 h5 48. dxc7 Nb4 49. Qg8+ Kh6 50. f4 g5 51. f5 g4 52. h4 Bxf5 53. exf5 Nxa2 54. Qh8#

[edit] See also

• List of chess games between Anand and Kramnik

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• Viswanathan Anand, My Best Games of Chess (Gambit, 2001 (new edition))

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Viswanathan Anand

• Viswanathan Anand on Twitter (Chessbase article on Anand's Twitter account)
• Anand's passport
• FIDE rating card for Viswanathan Anand
• Anand wins World Championship 2010
• 500+ photos from the World Championship 2010
• Viswanathan Anand at CSA Celebrity Speakers
• Latest Videos of Viswanathan Anand
• Viswanathan Anand games at 365Chess.com
• Viswanathan Anand player profile at ChessGames.com
• Interview with Viswanathan Anand at LatestChess.com year 2007
• TIME: History of Chess, by Viswanathan Anand
• Startup Lessons from Viswanathan Anand
• Interview with CNN IBN, May 2008
• Interview at ChessBase
• Rating data
• Latest news about Anand
• Edward Winter, List of Books About Anand, Kramnik and Topalov
• Vishy Anand on lessons to board room from the board Economic Times
• "India Swoons Over Its Chess Champ, and Even the Game" New York Times August 9, 2010