Right now I am not thinking about my retirement: Vishwanathan Anand

“If my results doesn’t hold up than I might consider it, right now I am seriously not thinking about it because so far i have been playing well. It is very hard to plan for a retirement because switching off from one of the biggest thing that I have done till now will be a bit of shock. I don’t think i am ready for it,” said Anand.

Talking about the future of chess in India, he said: “Right now we have a very solid depth in chess. If u go by the ranking, Harekrishna is right behind me in the rating list. We have a lot more youngsters who are doing well incredibly well. In almost every tournament I go to, I run into some other Indian who is also playing.”

The Indian chess icon feels that introduction of chess in schools can further popularize this sport.

 

He said, “In future chess as a sport can be introduced in schools, we have a lot of chess academies in our country but chess in school can introduce this sport to a large number of youngsters. As we know that chess has a lot of educational benefits as well, like problem solving and the efforts you put in chess, one can always find works with their studies as well.”

On asking about his take on the recent controversies regarding the appointment of Bollywood actor Salman Khan as the goodwill ambassador of India's campaign in Rio Olympic, Anand said: “We want everyone to get involved, but that should not be at the expense of sports. The focus should be more on the athletes. If the needs of the sportspersons are addressed, there’s no problem in involving non-sports personalities.”  

Applauding the success of gymnast Dipa Karmakar to become the first Indian women gymnast to qualify for the Rio Olympics, he said: “It is really nice to see a breakthrough in another sport. Now we have presence in gymnastics as well, i would like to wish he all the best.”

(Reporting by Adit Majumder, Images by Subhodeep Sardar/IBNS)