Who is Divya Deshmukh? Meet India's 4th female grandmaster who clinched Women's Chess World Cup 2025
Divya's historical moment came against none other than fellow Indian chess legend Koneru Humpy. The FIDE star follows Humpy, R. Vaishali, and Harika Dronavalli in taking the prestigious Grandmaster title.
Unlike most who tread the long road of GM norms and rating milestones, Divya's achievement of the Grandmaster title came from an atypical path.
Usually, chess players earn the 'Grandmaster' title by achieving three GM norms and a FIDE rating of 2500 or more.
There's however, an another way of securing the title—winning top-level competitions including the FIDE Women's World Cup — which Divya Deshmukh did on Monday.
Divya Deshmukh was born on December 9, 2005 in Maharashtra's Nagpur.
As per Chess.com, Divya's world ranking stands at 905.
Previously, Deshmukh has bagged the 2022 women's chess champion, 2023 Asian women's champion, and 2024 Under‑20 World Champion titles, mentioned the Chess website.
The FIDE Women's World Cup 2025 final match between Divya and Humpy was nothing short of a clash of generations—19-year-old Divya facing off against veteran Humpy, who is India's first woman Grandmaster and twice her age. In this image released by Flickr, India's chess players Koneru Humpy and Divya Deshmukh during the FIDE Women's World Cup 2025 final match tiebreaks, in Batumi, Georgia, Monday, July 28, 2025. (Flickr/Andrey Anosov via PTI Photo)(PTI07_28_2025_000265A)
More significantly, it was an all-Indian final, while China's Tan Zhongyi and Lei Tingjie competed for third place.
Divya's latest feat makes her the 88th Grandmaster in India.
The victory for the Nagpur player came after the two classical games played on Saturday and Sunday ended in draws.
Having drawn the two classical games, it was the first set of tiebreakers that proved decisive as Humpy lost her nerves. Except the World Cup and the Women's World Championship, Humpy has won everything under the sun but, as fate or nerves would have it, the World Cup title eluded her.
Divya showed steely resolve on Monday, and the bonus for the determination was the Grandmaster title, reserved for the champion of this event, reported ANI.
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