By 17-year-old Indian chess grandmaster Dommaraju Gukesh created history recently when he became the youngest person to win the FIDE Candidates Tournament. The 2024 Candidates Tournament was held in Toronto between 3rd April and 22nd April, 2024 to determine the challenger for the World Chess Championship .
At the 2024 Candidates Tournament, Gukesh won five matches (once against Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, twice against Nijat Abasov, once against Vidit Gujrathi, and once against Alireza Firouzja), lost one and drew eight, thereby finishing at the top of the table among the contenders in the Open category with 9 points in 14 matches. The only game in the tournament that he lost was to Alireza Firouzja from Iran. He was not considered a favourite to win the title by many but he did spring a surprise with his brilliant moves.
Gukesh, the third youngest grandmaster in the world,  the third youngest to reach a chess rating of 2700, and the youngest to reach a rating of 2750, held the Japan born American chess grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura to a draw in the Round 14 of the tournament to reach nine points. However, the draw between Ian Nepomniachtchi and Fabiano Caruana after 109 moves eventually made Gukesh the winner of FIDE Candidates 2024 Tournament.Â
Here it deserves a mention that FIDE Candidates is one of the most prestigious chess competitions in the world. This tournament to determine the challenger to contest in the next Chess World Championship was being held in North America for the first time.
FIDE Candidates 2024 was a double round-robin tournament with each player playing the rest of the competitors twice in a total of 14 rounds. The players earn 1 point for a win, ½ point for a draw and no point for loss. The Indian contingent for this prestigious tournament comprised Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, Rameshbabu Vaishali, Koneru Humpy, D. Gukesh, and Vidit Gujrathi.
Now Gukesh has also become only the second Indian to qualify for the World Chess Championship final in the classical format. The first was none other than Vishwanathan Anand. The chess prodigy from Chennai will now also be the youngest player in the World Chess Championship. At the World Chess Championship, he will compete with the reigning world chess champion Ding Liren.
Son of an ENT surgeon(father) and a microbiologist(mother), Gukesh, who was born in Chennai on 29th May 2006, began his chess journey at the age of seven. He first attained global limelight in 2015 by winning the Under-9 section of the Asian School Chess Championships.
This was followed by winning the World Youth Chess Championships in 2018 in the Under 12 category. Gukesh achieved the distinction of becoming the second-youngest grandmaster in history on 15th January 2019, at the age of 12 years, 7 months, and 17 days(now he is the third youngest grandmaster in the world after Abhimanyu Mishra and Sergey Karjakin).
Gukesh reached a rating of over 2700 for the first time in September 2022, which made him the third youngest player to pass 2700 after Wei Yi and Alireza Firouzja.In Chess World Cup 2023, Gukesh reached the quarter-finals where he was defeated by Norwegian chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen.
Of course these are not the only feathers in Gukeshâs crowded cap. In the September 2023 rating list, the super talented chess player officially surpassed Vishwanathan Anand as the top-ranked Indian chess player. It took 37 years to dislodge Anand from the position of being the top-ranked Indian chess player.
Impressive Indian Performance at 2024 Candidates Tournament
Other Indian players also performed impressively at the tournament. Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa won three matches, lost three and drew eight to earn 7 points from the tournament whereas his sister Vaishali Rameshbabu, who like Praggnanandhaa is also a grandmaster, won six matches, lost five and drew three of her matches in the tournament to earn 7.5 points from her 14 games.
Here it deserves a mention that Praggnanandhaa and his elder sister  Rameshbabu Vaishali have together achieved the coveted distinction of being the first brother and sister to hold the Grandmaster title. They are till now the only Grandmaster sibling duo in the world.Â
 Vidit Gujrathi won three matches, lost five and drew six to earn 6 points from the 2024 Candidates Tournament, whereas Koneru Humpy won three matches, lost two and drew nine of her 14 matches in the tournament. She earned 7.5 points.
