The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Simultaneous chess with six challengers in different cities

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 01, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Simultaneous chess with six challengers in different cities

Susan Muthalaly

Viswanathan Anand promotes NIIT's `synchronous learning' technology But playing practical chess is equally important, says the grandmaster

FACE TO FACE: World number one Viswanathan Anand makes a move in Kolkata while his opponent in Chennai Mahalakshmi (right) looks on. — Photo: K.V. Srinivasan

CHENNAI: Being in six places at the same time may have lost its novelty in this age of video conferencing. But playing chess with six champions in six different cities simultaneously is. And who else but world number one Viswanathan Anand for the task.

NIIT Imperia, which conducts management courses certified by the IIMs of Ahmedabad, Kolkata and Indore, got the NIIT brand ambassador to participate in the event to promote their `synchronous learning' technology, used to conduct their courses.

He first gave an analysis of his game played recently at Linares with Magnus Carlsen of Norway, from the NIIT Imperia studio in Kolkata. It was viewed at centres in Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad.

He said, in a press conference later, that he wished he could use this technology earlier. "It is important to use technology when you have it," he said in a reply to a question about whether computers have made players less innovative. However, playing practical chess is very important, he emphasised.

"While performing at the board, player interaction is vital, you often feed off an opponent's emotions or nervousness. And you have to experience all this," he said.

He said he was concentrating on the World Championships in Mexico later this year. He said he wasn't really thinking of his world champion title as it tended to make one complacent.

Anand's Chennai opponent, eight-year-old M. Mahalakshmi, a world number 3 herself and number one in India in the under-8 category, seemed unperturbed playing against the champion. Chess has taken her around the country and abroad; she's played tournaments in Iran and Georgia.

Mahalakshmi has plenty of practice, as her sister too is a prize-winning champion. Although it wasn't a competition, Anand noticed Mahalakshmi's strategy of playing and said she was very different from the others.

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