Bharat Chess Rating System’is a welcome move: Players, coaches

Chennai: Indian chess players and coaches have welcomed the All India Chess Federation’s (AICF) decision to have a National Rating System or ‘Bharat Chess Rating System’ as it would result in the emergence of large number of tournaments, enthuse chess masters to play in the strong domestic circuit, tingle the chess body’s cash chest amongst other benefits.

According to them, the casualty may be FIDE rated chess tournaments as the tournament organisers might opt for AICF rated tournaments and in the process save costs (FIDE fees) and may pass on the benefits to the players as prize money or lower entry fee, they added.

The international body, too, has no objection to AICF’s move.

“Internal rating system is the decision of each National Federation. FIDE does not interfere. At present dozens of thousands of Indians have FIDE rating, but obviously there are hundreds of thousands in India who play regularly in competitions of various kinds. So, it is sensible to rate them,” chess Grandmaster (GM) Emil Sutovsky, CEO, FIDE, told IANS. Terming AICF’s move as a great step forward GM Pravin Thipsay told IANS: “It means that even the performance in district events will be measured. As all national and international tournaments in India will be counted for the Indian Rating List, every national player will have an Indian rating and ELO rating of FIDE.”

According to Thipsay, the comparison between these two ratings will set some standards and district-level players will be able to judge themselves.

Queried about the difference between the USCF and FIDE rating, GM Priyadharshan Kannappan told IANS: “The USCF rating will be lower by about 100 points as compared to FIDE rating. That is, if a player is rated as 2,200 points under the USCF, his FIDE rating will be about 2,100.”

Kannappan said in the US there are a very small number of FIDE-rated chess tournaments as almost all the tournaments are USCF rated.

“After a tournament the result data has to be keyed into the USCF portal and soon after that the updated ratings of the players will be shown,” Kannappan said. After the Competition Commission of India’s order, many private tournaments are being held in India which are not recognised by AICF or the state chess associations. With the Bharat Chess Rating System there may be pressure from the players on the tournament organisers to hold the event under Indian rating system resulting in additional revenue for AICF, is one of the views.

On the other hand the entry fee for such tournaments will also be less. It is better for the tournament organisers to get more entries.(IANS)

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