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Journalism of Courage
Indian chess player Vaishali Rameshbabu became a Grandmaster by crossing 2,500 International Chess Federation (FIDE) ranking points at the IV El Llobregat Open in Spain on Friday (December 1). She is only the third Indian woman player to achieve the title, besides Koneru Humpy and Harika Dronavalli.
With this development, Vaishali and her younger brother, Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, have become the first-ever Grandmaster brother-sister duo in history. But who is a Grandmaster? What does it take to become a Grandmaster? What are the other titles in chess? We take a look.
A Grandmaster
Grandmaster is the highest title or ranking that a chess player can achieve. The Grandmaster title — and other chess titles — is awarded by the International Chess Federation, FIDE (acronym for its French name Fédération Internationale des Échecs), the Lausanne-Switzerland-based governing body of the international game.
The title is the badge of the game’s super-elite, a recognition of the greatest chess talent on the planet, which has been tested and proven against a peer group of other similarly talented players in the world’s toughest competitions.
Other (lesser) titles
Besides Grandmaster, the Qualification Commission of FIDE recognises and awards seven other titles: International Master (IM), FIDE Master (FM), Candidate Master (CM), Woman Grandmaster (WGM), Woman International Master (WIM), Woman FIDE Master (WFM), and Woman Candidate Master (WCM).
Titles are for life
All the titles, including that of Grandmaster, are valid for life, unless a player is stripped of the title for a proven offence such as cheating. Thus, the “use of a FIDE title or rating to subvert the ethical principles of the title or rating system may subject a person to revocation of his title”, and “in case it is found after a title has been awarded that the player was in breach of the Anti-Cheating Regulations in one or more of the tournaments on which the title application was based, then the title may be removed by the Qualification Commission”.
Grandmasters since 1950
The term grandmaster is about a century old, and was initially used as a generic expression to describe a player who was better than just a master. In 1950, FIDE started to formally designate the best players as Grandmasters, based on a set of laid-down criteria. Twenty-seven Grandmaster titles were awarded in the first batch in 1950, including to then-world champion Mikhail Botvinnik of the erstwhile USSR, and several players who were greats of their time, but who were no longer competing then.
Qualifications for Grandmaster
Thereafter, the qualifications for Grandmaster were changed several times, including in 1957, 1965, and 1970. Currently, FIDE awards chess’s highest honour to a player who is able to achieve a FIDE Classical or Standard rating of 2,500, plus three Grandmaster norms.
Grandmaster norms are defined by a set of complex and rigorous rules regarding tournaments, games, and players, that are set out in the FIDE Title Regulations.
Each norm is very difficult to attain. Broadly, a player must have a performance rating of 2,600 or higher in a FIDE tournament that has nine rounds, playing against several opponents from federations or countries other than the one to which the player belongs, and those opponents must be titled themselves.
