Thursday, July 14, 2011

2012 World Championship in India!

World Champion Anand is scheduled to defend his title against Israeli GM Boris Gelfand in India next year.

This will be the first time an event of this stature is hosted in India. The match will be played in Chennai, India from April-May 2012.

Press Release


Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa has accepted to stage the Anand versus Gelfand World Chess title match either in April or in May of 2012. The budget for the event which is Rs. 20 Crore will be sponsored by the Tamil Nadu Government. This followed a meeting FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov had with the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister at Chennai this morning.

At a subsequent meet-the-press, held at the Russian Cultural Centre in Chennai on July 13, 2011, J.C.D. Prabhakar, President of the AICF announced the Chennai bid for the world title match which is likely to go through on July 31, 2011.

When this event happens, this will become the biggest chess event ever in India in terms of importance as well as prize money. Two World Championship semi-finals were held at Sanghinagar (near Hyderabad) in February 1995 and the two semi-finals were held in Delhi in December 2000. The finals has never taken place in Indian soil.

Viswanathan Anand is a four-time world champion and would be looking forward to defend and keep his title for a fifth time next summer.

In a Tamil Nadu Government Press Release No.444 dated July 13, 2011, the Chief Minister J. Jayalalitha had sanctioned the amount for this title match which has not been staged in India before.

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