Is Viswanathan Anand India’s Greatest Unsung Sports Icon?

On 11 May 2010, Viswanathan Anand retained his World Chess Champion title by defeating Bulgarian challenger Veselin Topalov in the 12^th and final game. Anand’s victory is creditable since he beat Topalov in the challenger’s backyard at Sofia, Bulgaria – despite being forced to travel 40 hours by road to reach the venue, after all air traffic was disrupted due to the volcanic ash crisis over Europe.^[1] And despite being considered over the hill and losing the first game itself (thanks in part due to the tiring 2,000-km bus journey to Sofia).

Anand’s heroics in winning in Bulgaria notwithstanding, his efforts have barely been hailed in India, while the losing T20 cricket team has received reams of newsprint.^[2] Had Anand been a cricketer scaling commensurate peaks, he would have been felicitated by all and sundry as well as covered in newsprint, endorsements and gold.  

The poor status accorded to chess, as well as the towering yet ‘faceless’ credibility enjoyed by Anand, is well illustrated by an anecdote Anand narrates: “When I was travelling by train in Kerala many years ago, a fellow passenger asked me about my profession. ‘I’m a chess player,’ I replied. ‘You wouldn’t be able to make a living out of chess unless you are Viswanathan Anand,’ he shot back. I told him I was the Anand he was referring to!”^[3]

                                                               

In this respect, Anand could be sailing in the same boat as India’s former hockey wizard Dhyan Chand. Although undoubtedly the world’s greatest hockey player of all time, Dhyan Chand died disillusioned and penniless on 3 December 1979, spending his last days uncared for in a general ward of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, undergoing treatment for liver cancer.^[4]

Hopefully, Anand is investing wisely for a rainy day and will avoid the fate that befell Major Dhyan Chand during his sunset years.