NEW DELHI, September 26: Tania Sachdev, who has brought laurels to the country in several international chess meets, is facing a predicament. The Delhi girl is without any sponsorship support to fund her trip to Orpesa el Mar in Spain where she will represent India in the World (under-12) chess championship next month.Bronze-medallist last year in the same championship, Tania will be among the favourites for the title this year and is working up to seven hours a day in preparing for the prestigious meet. All her preparations might well come to a nought if no corporate sponsors comes to her aid within the next fornight.National title-holder in the National (under-12) championship in both classical and rapid versions of the game, Tania has carved a niche for herself despite the absence of any well-laid out system for the sport in the Capital. Unlike metros like Chennai and calcutta, where inter-club chess tournaments, weekend competitions provide regular match-play experience to the budding champions, Delhi lacks this support. Therefore, the achievements of Tania stand out even more.Tania shot into prominence even before her eighth birthday in 1994 when she won five titles in the British championship. Since then, Tania has not looked back. Under the watchful eyes of chess experts K.C. Joshi and his elder brother G.B. Joshi, Tania has taken gaint strides.Her game has matured a great deal and her recent performances have been simply stupendous, considering her tender age. With an ever increasing Elo rating, which presently stands at 2090, Tania is showing promise of living up to the great potential she showed a few years ago.After winning the Commonwealth girls (under-16) title at Bikaner in April this year, Tania chose to concentrate on playing in strong internationally rated tournaments. Her resolve began showing the results almost immediately.In the Delhi State championship this year, Tania remained unbeaten to finish second behind champion Gurpreet Pal Singh. On her way, she embarrassed many a big names and became the first girl to represent Delhi in the National `B' championship.As it turned out, Tania stunned International Master Neeraj Kumar Mishra and three other highly rated players to return seven points from this 13-round tournament.Only last week, Tania came a creditable third in a tough field of 64 in the Iqbal Krishna chess tournament. Her victims included her coach G.B. Joshi. She drew with the former Natinal (under-25) champion Nassir Wajih after pulling off a similar verdict against another fancied player, Harish Sharma.So, going by her current form, Tania looks in fine fettle to bring another delightful result for the followers of this sport in India. Armed with a laptop computer, courtsy Nestle, which has also offerd Rs 25,000 for chess software, Tania is promising to scale new heights. But without adequate funds to support, Tania's participation in overseas competitions will suffer. One only hopes that some thoughtful corporate comes to her rescue.
