School students, gear up for state-level chess tournaments to be organised by All India Chess Federation

The All India Chess Federation (AICF), as part of holding its 44th Chess Olympiad in India, will be conducting a state-level chess tournament for school students across the nation.

As many as 268 school-going students will be selected out of these tournaments to witness the Chess Olympiad, which will be held for the very first time in Mahabalipuram in Tamil Nadu, India from July 28 to August 10, as per AICF.

The initiative, a part of the Chess in Schools Project by the AICF, will be conducted through the state associations and with the support of the Government of Tamil Nadu, the AICF shared.

The federation will be spending Rs 86 lakhs to organise these tournaments and create chess awareness mainly among the school children to boost chess activities in the country ahead of the upcoming Chess Olympiad.

In total, 76 kids from 38 districts of Tamil Nadu and six players from each of the other 32 states/union territories affiliated to AICF will be travelling to Mahabalipuram to witness the Olympiad.

Moreover, no entry fee will be collected from the players to participate in the tournaments. An additional travelling allowance will also be provided to each student with free boarding and lodging for three days.

The AICF will be allocating a total of Rs 1,00,000 for each district for the district-level tournament in Tamil Nadu while Rs 1,50,000 will be provided to each of the 32 states/UTs affiliated to the chess body.

"We are trying to attract the younger generation to chess. Our aim is to ensure the participation of at least 30,000 students in this project. For school children, access to travel and tickets for the Olympiad would be difficult and we want to provide them this much-needed exposure. We are spending about Rs 1 crore on this project," said Bharat Singh Chauhan, Tournament Director and AICF Secretary.

Also, school children who have registered with the federation for the year 2022-23 and are below 15 years of age will be taking part in the competition, and it will be held for both boys and girls in each state for two days.

The host state Tamil Nadu will organise district-level tournaments in all the districts separately.

The winners and runners-up of the state-level tournaments as well as the best boy and girl among the government schools will be selected, while from Tamil Nadu, the champions from each district will get to witness the Chess Olympiad.