Anand Mahindra Celebrates Humpy Koneru’s Historic Win in World Rapid Chess Championship

Industrialist and prolific social media presence Anand Mahindra took to Twitter to celebrate Humpy Koneru’s historic win of her second World Rapid Chess Championship title. Mahindra, known for his engaging posts on social media, hailed Koneru as “an Indian Queen” in a tweet, thanking her for making the nation proud.

Koneru secured her second World Rapid Chess Championship title by defeating Irene Sukandar of Indonesia in New York on December 29. This victory marks a significant milestone for Koneru, as she becomes only the second player, after China’s Ju Wenjun, to clinch the title more than once.

The 37-year-old chess prodigy expressed her joy and surprise at the win, stating, “I’m very excited and I feel very happy. In fact, I expected it to be a very tough day, like some sort of tie-break. But when I finished the game, I only got to know when the arbitrator told me, and it was a tense moment for me. So, this is quite unexpected because the whole year I have been struggling a lot and I had very bad tournaments where I just ended up in last place. So, this came as a surprise.”

Koneru’s victory adds to India’s recent success in the world of chess, following D Gukesh’s triumph in the World Championship and India’s gold medal wins in the Chess Olympiad. Humpy believes that her win will inspire more youngsters in India to pursue chess professionally, stating, “I think it’s high time for India. We also have Gukesh as world champion and now I got the second world title in the rapid event. So, I think this will motivate a lot of youngsters to take up chess professionally.”

With Indian chess players making waves on the global stage, the future looks bright for the sport in the country, thanks to the remarkable achievements of players like Humpy Koneru and the support of influential figures like Anand Mahindra.