Introduction
Let’s start this blog with an awesome fact There are around 600 Million fans of Chess around the whole world Not even a single game is more popular than Chess And Chess was originated in India But we never earned any rank Russia dominates the whole world And during the cold war between the US and the Soviet Union A game of chess between these two became like a game of cricket between India and Pakistan We will understand all these facts in details
Let’s Start from the beginning
Evolution of Chess
Chaturanga was played in India around the 6th Century Chaturanga is a Hindi word that means having four limbs Our army also had four divisions Infantry, Cavalry, elephant riding army, and Chariot army Similarly in the Chess We have Pawns, Knight, Bishop, and Rook Look, Chaturanga was different from Chess But Chess has been originated from this game only And at that time Chess become so popular in India that I read a story in my childhood in which two kings started fighting for real after Playing a game of chess and eventually killed each other How Chess, which was originated in India become popular in the whole world Can be understood by this Map which was published in a book in 1949 In the 700th Century, Chess reached Persia or Iran Then Arabia and then the whole of Europe And on the right side of the world map chess reached China, Japan, Korea, Cambodia, Burma, etc And by the 1600s Chess become popular in the whole world But the form in which Chess is present today Was started in the mid-19th century When global competitions of chess were started Chess also has a strong relationship with many religions Look at the influence of Christianity Queen, Bishop originated from there And the Islamic invasion also played a major role in this ‘Your queen is in danger’ Chess reached Arabia from Persia due to the Islamic invasion Chess and Religion have such a complex relationship That many countries have banned chess due to many religious reasons These countries used to say playing chess is a sin The evolution of the name Chess is also very interesting Shatranj from Chaturanga is quite understandable, language has evolved But where did chess come from? That’s hidden in Iran In Iran, King is called ‘Shah’ And when the game reached Italy, Germany, and France from Iran Its name evolved like this Scacchi, Echecs, Schach, Chess
The Russian Dominance in chess
let’s talk about Russians Only in the perspective of Chess Garry Kasparov one of the most popular Chess players is a Russian But he is not alone Russia has more than 500 Grandmasters in chess which is 15 percent of the whole world And if we compare, then India has only 73 Grandmasters And the countries are ranked according to the number of chess titles they have won Russia has more than 2600 chess titles The US is ranked second with 800 chess titles Look at the difference Russia dominates the whole world in Chess But How did it all start? For this, you should know the story of ‘Ivan’ The Terrible He was the king of Russia in the 1500s People say he died while playing Chess in 1585 On the side note Ivan The Terrible was quite a weird person So is his name He broke the skull of his 27-year-old son in anger And then he put his son in his lap Arguing to make his son alive again And kept his dead body with himself for many years And he was very fond of Playing Chess In 1551, due to religious reasons, he also banned Chess After the collapse of ‘Ivan’ The Terrible Chess gradually become popular in Russia And after this, great Russian leaders like Lenin and Stalin were also huge fans of Chess Lenin used to get aggressive after losing a game of Chess And Stalin used to popularize the fake games in the people’s mind He used to give false information regarding winning with him or any other Once, his Commander in Chief got an Idea He thought, If we became popular in Chess then we can dominate the whole world Then he started various schools to teach Chess and organized various competitions And he prepared strongly between 1920 to 1948 to make Russia dominate the whole world in chess From 1948 to 1991, only Russians used to win International Chess tournaments The Soviet Union was looking at Chess as a Revolution Chess and Revolution were very relatable for them And since Chess is a game of Skills And Russians love intellectualism And due to the extreme cold weather in Russia People use to stay in their homes Chess is a very affordable game So Chess is popular among the natives of Russia. Russians have a crazy obsession with Chess All this was about the Russians
The US vs USSR story
Now, let’s look at the US Like I said before, the Soviet Union used to win every Chess tournament between 1948 to 1991 But in 1972, an American Bobby Fisher Crusher defeated Russia’s Boris Spassky And after this Americans become Crazy There is a Marshall Chess Club in the New York Which was started in 1915 with a membership of 400 people And after that game, this membership number was doubled immediately And just like Bobby Fisher was responsible for this craze Shelby Lyman was also responsible for the Craze He used to teach the game of Chess on television He himself was a Chess player And after watching him on the television, people become more interested in Chess By this, we get to know that The popularity is getting created around the content of Chess Has a great impact
Content drives chess popularity
The game involving Bobby was played in 1972 But even after 50 years this story is absolutely true Because two years earlier than today In October 2020, a series was released on Netflix which was titled Queen’s Gambit This series was based on the game of Chess And after the release of this series look at this google trend searches of Chess spiked And in the past two years, chess.com, a website that is used by people to play Chess Has observed its monthly users increase from 8 million to 17 million That series has played a big role in this success And the streaming of Chess in the past two years on platforms like Twitch and YouTube also caused an increase in the monthly users of chess.com Globally and also in India many people like Akira Nakamura, Samay Raina, Sagar Shah and many others Livestream the content on Chess on Twitch and YouTube And they have viewers in lacs There is no count of the number of people that start playing Chess for the first time after watching these live streams So there is a direct impact of content creation on the popularity of Chess Now, this was all about Chess on the global level
Now, let’s return to India
The Future of Bharat and chess
Why we are not able to dominate in a game which was originated in India? We have heard the name Vishwanathan Anand from our Childhood days But do you know any other Indian Chess players? The reason behind this is Till the year 2007, India only had 20 Grandmasters of chess But now things are changing This number has now reached 73 R Praggnanandhaa who became the youngest International master in 2018 Is in the global headlines recently after defeating the world champion Magnus Carlsen And now more such players are emerging From 28th July, International Chess Olympiad is going to be conducted in India So in the coming 4 to 5 years, we can surely say our time will come Playing Chess will not only benefit India but also you personally With every move, you can learn planning skills Memory is enhanced by memorizing the moves And a study which was conducted in 2016, has shown that the symptoms of ADHD are reduced after Playing a game of Chess The way our attention span is deteriorating after watching reels of 30 seconds Chess can help you improve that And for these same reasons, Today’s generation which is always in a hurry enjoys this slow game of Chess Whether it only involves watching the game of Chess vigorously on Livestreams So, if you also love playing Chess Then tell your rank in the comment section
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