Young Charvi's life in a chess bubble

Hindustan Times

01-06-2025

Stavanger, Norway: The Norway Chess Open tournament — held at walking distance from the hotel that hosts the starry GMs — is a beehive of norm-chasing chess players, ranging from age 6 to 60, and local Norwegians to Indian expats. Unlike the main acts who are escorted for official post-game interviews and soon into the car, they all have things to do once their games are done: grab a snack, look for their chaperones, dial their parents for pickup.
Charvi A had something else in mind. Right after coming out of the hall, the 11-year-old left the water bottle with her mother, searched for her opponent and stood talking with the older man for an extended time. Why? To analyse the game.
Such post-game analysis chats can go from five minutes to thirty, said her mother, Akhila. And almost always, it is Charvi initiating them, if her opponent is willing and speaks English. For this
11-year-old, chess is not a chore, it is compulsive. And she is quite promising at it.
A Woman FIDE Master (WFM) with a 1961 Elo rating, Charvi won the U-8 girls World Championship in 2022, a feat that made Viswanathan Anand post on X: 'Rise of a new star.' Charvi has picked up more accolades at the national and Asian level — she was conferred the 2024 Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar, India's highest civilian honour for children, for which her parents had applied — thinking about the game in overdrive.
'Sometimes, she thinks about the moves in her dreams also,' said Akhila.
It is not, however, thrust upon her. This year so far, she has played in around seven tournaments, in India, Austria, France, Uzbekistan, Budapest and Norway. Even in the few break days she gets in between, the kid is eager to do stuff around chess and puzzles.
'She has decided that she wants to only do this. We have asked her many times, but she likes the sport,' Akhila said. 'Instead of us parents forcing her to do something, we wanted to support her in what she was interested in. We realised she is really interested in chess.'
And realised her ability and promise after she won the U-8 world title. Having picked up the game in her day care at age 5, chess got Charvi mesmerised, and her parents were left scrambling for YouTube videos that she demanded they watch and play with her.
After finishing runner-up in a U-6 state competition, she began training with IM Shivananda BS in Bengaluru. As she progressed, Charvi was coached by GM Swayams Mishra, WGM Aarthie Ramaswamy, and even briefly by her husband RB Ramesh, R Praggnanandhaa's coach. She is now training with a 'few new coaches', names of which her mother said she could not reveal.
Partly sponsored, Charvi's father has continued his IT job while Akhila, a professional in the same sector for over a decade, quit her work a couple of years ago to travel with her. Her school lessons are sent online, which Akhila oversees amid all the travel.
'I have to do this because she is very young, and may not understand what she is going through,' she said.
The mother does not understand the game, nor does she discuss it with Charvi. Results are never asked until, if at all, told. The kid was a centre of attention when she met PM Narendra Modi for the award, and yet wasn't frazzled.
'She doesn't get too excited. Even after she won the world championships, she was very normal. She can handle winning, losing or the attention,' Akhila said. 'She is playing just out of passion.'