The Hindu, India
November 29, 2004

WORLD STILL LOOKING FOR UNDISPUTED KING

by Stan Rayan

Chess will have a new junior World champion in a couple of days in
Kochi. And a few of the stars here, like India’s P. Harikrishna, a
strong favourite for the boys World title, and the aggressive
Armenian Tigran Petrosian, could threaten the big guns in the men’s
World in a few years time.

But unfortunately, while the junior scene appears very promising, the
world of men’s champions is ridden with chaos.

The sport does not even have a proper men’s World champion, a king
who could be accepted by everybody. While Uzbekistan’s Rustam
Kashimdzhanov is the FIDE World champion, Russian Vladimir Kramnik
was crowned as the non-FIDE World champion a few weeks ago.

Attempts to unify the World title, to produce an undisputed champion,
also look absurd.

For the unification match, which has the backing of the world chess
federation FIDE and which is likely to be held in Dubai some time
next year, will have the planet’s No.1 player Garry Kasparov playing
Kasimdzhanov, who is currently ranked No. 47 in the latest FIDE list.

Sadly, since the series will be without some of the sport’s biggest
stars, like Indian Viswanathan Anand and Kramnik, the World number
two and three respectively, the disputes are likely to continue,
throwing the sport into a bigger chaos.

But the world chess federation is keen on going ahead with the
Kasparov-Kasimdzhanov match, said the FIDE vice-president P.T. Ummer
Koya.

“The issue was discussed at the recent FIDE general assembly held
during the Olympiad in Calvia (in Spain). Dubai will be the venue of
the match and there is no change. But we have not finalised the new
dates,” said Mr Koya.

After retaining his classical chess World title recently in
Switzerland, Kramnik came up with a proposal to unite the crown.

“Instead of the Kasimdzhanov-Kasparov match, we could hold a
tournament with the participation of Kasparov, Kasimdzhanov, Anand
and Ruslan Ponomariov with the winner playing against me for the
world title,” said Kramnik in a recent interview.

Both Anand and Ponomariov are former FIDE world champions.

“Kramnik’s proposal sounds good. Unfortunately, such a thing working
out is very remote,” said Mr Koya. “And FIDE did not discuss
Kramnik’s proposal at the Calvia general assembly,” he said.

The non-FIDE title came into existence when Kasparov, the then World
champion, broke from FIDE in 1993 to create the now defunct
Professional Chess Association (PCA).

Kasparov beat Nigel Short of England in 1993 and Viswanathan Anand of
India in 1995, before losing to Kramnik in 2000.

The recent match Switzerland with Hungarian Peter Leko was Kramnik’s
first defense of the title.

Kramnik’s proposal has a strong supporter in Poland’s Radoslaw
Wojtaszek, the lone current world champion at the Kochi Junior Worlds
that resumes on Monday after today’s rest day.

“The title will have value only if the world’s top four or five
players figure in it. And Anand is currently the world’s best player.
He’s just fantastic,” said Wojtaszek who won the under-18 World title
a few days in Greece.

“But we should not give in to the players,” asserts Koya.

“If the association does not assert its supremacy, the game suffers,”
he said.