List of Indian Chess Players - Grandmasters (GMs)

By : Neha Dhyani

Updated : Feb 28, 2023, 13:07

Among all the Indian chess players, India boasts of 73 Grand Masters (GM), 18 Woman Grand Masters (WGM), 125 International Masters (IM), 42 Woman International Masters (WIM), and 33,028 rated players, according to the International Chess Federation (FIDE), as of January 2021.

The best 10 Indian chess players, with their average rating of 2670, make them the fourth highest in the world after Russia, the United States, and China. India's top 10 active women chess players have an average rating of 2405, the third-highest in the world after China and Russia.

Indian Grandmasters - Awards and Recognition

Several chess players have been awarded the highest civilian and sports recognition and honours in India, like the Padma Award and the Arjuna Award. Viswanathan Anand was the first athlete to receive the second-highest citizenship honour, Padma Vibhushan, in 2008 and the first highest sports honour, Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, from 1991 to 1992.

The Indian chess community has added two more names to the ever-growing list of Indian Grandmasters (GMs) - Sankarp Gupta and Mitrabha Guha, who are India's 71st and 72nd GMs, respectively. India is slowly climbing the ladder, with chess experiencing a massive boom in India.

The Indian Grandmaster List

Many believe that the rise in the popularity of chess in India is solely due to the pandemic, but the fact remains that chess has boomed in India for over a decade. This is evidenced by the fact that India has more than tripled in terms of the number of Grand Masters in the last decade from 2011 to 2021. By 2010, India had only 23 GMs, which significantly increased to 72 between 2011 and 2021, with a total of 49 Grand Masters emerging from India in the past 10 years.

List of Top 10 Indian Grandmasters

The list of the top 10 Indian grandmasters is as follows

S.No.	Player	Rating
1.	Viswanathan Anand	2753
2.	Pentala Harikrishna	2730
3.	Santosh Gujrathi Vidit	2726
4.	B. Adhiban	2660
5.	Krishnan Sasikiran	2647
6.	SP Sethuraman	2644
7.	Chithambaram VR. Aravindh	2641
8.	Parimarjan Negi	2639
9.	Surya Shekhar Ganguly	2625
10.	S.L. Narayanan	2624

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FAQs about Indian grandmaster

Q.1 Who is the first Women Indian Grandmaster in chess?

Subbaraman Vijayalakshmi was the first woman in India to win the titles of FIDE International Master (IM) and Grandmaster (WGM) country. In 2001, she won the title of Female Grand Master (WGM) and also received the Arjuna Award from the Government of India.

Q.2 Who is the youngest Indian Grandmaster?

Gukesh D is India's youngest GM at the age of 12 years, 7 months, and 17 days, following Praggnanandhaa, who held a record at 1teh age of 12 years and 10 months in June 2018.

Q.3 Who is the first Indian Grandmaster in chess?

Viswanathan Anand became the first Indian Grandmaster in 1988 and is one of the few players to exceed the 2800 Elo rating, the first feat he achieved in 2006.

Q.4 How many names are featured in the Indian grandmasters in the chess list?

So far, India boasts of 67 Grandmasters, 42 Woman International Masters, 20 Woman Grand Masters, 124 International Masters, and a total of 33,028 rated players.