JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
The southern Indian city of Chennai has produced some of the world's most formidable chess players. Reporter Omkar Khandekar traveled there to learn more.
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OMKAR KHANDEKAR, BYLINE: It's a standing ovation for a new chess prodigy, 26-year-old Aravindh Chidambaram, crowned as the winner at Chennai Grand Masters tournament last year.
Fans rush to the door to catch him. They want selfies and autographs. The tournament organizers form a human chain so players can leave without being mobbed. Chess isn't just popular in India. Many here are good at it. Six Indians rank among the world's Top 25. And at the World Chess Championship last December...
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UNIDENTIFIED COMMENTATOR #1: Yeah, who...
UNIDENTIFIED COMMENTATOR #2: Oh, takes the bishop D5. Takes the bishop D5.
UNIDENTIFIED COMMENTATOR #1: And Gukesh will be the world champion.
KHANDEKAR: Indian national Gukesh Dommaraju became the youngest ever world champion at age 18. This is a remarkable shift for the chess world. After decades of Russian and European dominance, the spotlight is on India. And within India, one city is chess ground zero - Chennai, hometown of two world champions and a place that chess trainer V Saravanan calls the factory of Indian chess.
V SARAVANAN: Chess in Chennai is grown by a proper system of teaching from the grassroots.
KHANDEKAR: Saravanan says people in Chennai take chess very seriously. Some schools grant promising players holidays to train and travel. Local businesses pay their expenses. But perhaps the city's greatest asset is parents. Typically, Indian parents don't encourage their kids to pursue sports professionally. Chess is different. Saravanan again.
SARAVANAN: In India, we have this basic belief among parents that our way to happiness and prosperity is through academics. Chess, in some respects, resembles academics.
KHANDEKAR: So in recent years, chess clubs have mushroomed across the city.
VISHNU PRASANNA: Have you finished the homework?
KHANDEKAR: One of those chess clubs is run by Vishnu Prasanna. He says the success of some of his students, like the current world champion Gukesh Dommaraju, has turbocharged enrollments.
PRASANNA: We had a 3 1/2-year-old kid who was walking in yesterday to train with us. And parents are also viewing it, right? So they will love if their kid is playing chess.
KHANDEKAR: Some of them really want their kids to play chess. One father, Suresh Dasarathan, shared his 6-year-old son's daily routine. Wake up at 7, an hour of chess practice, then school, then an hour of chess coaching at the club, then homework, and bedtime at 9 p.m. Dasarathan says he wants his son to make it international.
SURESH DASARATHAN: If he's good in chess, definitely I will bring him to the next level and take him to the international podium. That is a dream - my dream.
KHANDEKAR: His dream - but it's down to the kids to make their parents' dreams come true. On the day of Chennai Grand Masters tournament, we met Rivina, a 6-year-old chess student whose mother asked that we only use her first name because of her age.
RIVINA: They will force the kids to win. And they will tell, I will give you dinner only if you win this game. And then some kids will just cry if they don't win.
KHANDEKAR: It's a striking contrast to just a few decades ago, when India's first chess champion was growing up in Chennai. Viswanathan Anand is a five-time world champion who even bested Russian legend Garry Kasparov. He says in the '80s, chess in India was seen as a hobby.
VISWANATHAN ANAND: In those days, the question was all sports were nice hobbies to have, and then the parents quickly guided you away, back to your studies the closer you got to the end of school because you need a real job.
KHANDEKAR: He says parents are taking chess more seriously now because it is something you can make a living from. The Indian government often gives champion players a job in the public sector. High-ranking players can win prize money in a newly launched Global Chess League. Many also work as chess coaches. Player and coach Srinath Narayanan says that's why Indian parents drive their kids so hard.
SRINATH NARAYANAN: There is a massive supply of people and very limited opportunities. And something like sport is also seen as a way to jump that queue.
KHANDEKAR: And even if players don't make it to the top...
NARAYANAN: Even if you don't end up making it big in chess, it is still helpful for you in whatever your primary career is.
KHANDEKAR: Their primary career - which, more often than not, is by going through the grind of academics. Omkar Khandekar, NPR News, Chennai.
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