New Delhi: It was a red-letter day not only for our chess fraternity, but Indian sport as well.
Poised for ultimate glory after Saturday’s action, Indian men and women kept their date with history to clinch maiden gold medals in the 45th Fide Chess Olympiad at Budapest on Sunday.
India thus became only the third country — after erstwhile USSR and China — to bag gold medals in both Open and Women’s events in the same Chess Olympiad.
The men outplayed Slovenia as D Gukesh, Arjun Erigaisi and Rameshbabu Praggnanadhaa won their respective matches in the 11th and final round of the Open event.
The men ended aggregated a staggering 21 points out of a possible 22, with a 2-2 draw against Uzbekistan being the lone non-win tie.
🇮🇳 India wins the 45th FIDE #ChessOlympiad! 🏆 ♟️
Congratulations to Gukesh D, Praggnanandhaa R, Arjun Erigaisi, Vidit Gujrathi, Pentala Harikrishna and Srinath Narayanan (Captain)! 👏 👏
Gukesh D beats Vladimir Fedoseev, and Arjun Erigaisi prevails against Jan Subelj; India… pic.twitter.com/jOGrjwsyJc
— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) September 22, 2024
The women then secured their place in the history books by overcoming Azerbaijan 3.5-0.5.
D Harika, Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal outwitted their rivals, while Rameshbabu Vaishali drew her game.
In the process, Divya confirmed her individual gold medal on the third board. She was the real star for the women’s team, with a superb performance of 9.5 out of 11.
Double GOLD for India! 🇮🇳 Team bounced back big time after a bad 8th and 9th round. IM Divya Deshmukh literally carried her team (9.5/11 around 2600 performance), with IM Agrawal Vantika contributed big time (7.5/9 around 2550 performance)! Big congratulations to the team! 👏… pic.twitter.com/E9Kk2v7JQV
— Susan Polgar (@SusanPolgar) September 22, 2024
Among the men, World championship challenger Gukesh registered a brilliant 9 out of 10 on the top board, while Arjun achieved 10 out of 11.
India had earlier won bronze medals in the Open section, in 2014 and 2022.
The women’s team bagged bronze in the 2022 Olympiad in Chennai.