This is one ‘coronation’ that happened with-out much fuss or fanfare…. Earlier this year, while the cricketing world was focussed on battles being fought on Caribbean pitches, the global domain of chess saw a new ruler being crowned. India’s first Grandmaster, Viswanathan Anand, capped a wonderful fortnight in March with the title at the Morelia-Linares Super Grandmasters Chess Tournament and was listed World Number One in the FIDE ratings that were released soon after, in April. It was a moment that the 37-year-old Anand – who has been in the world’s top three for the last 15 years – had been waiting for a really long time.

The news filtered back home…to much rejoicing in the homes of Anand’s family, friends and fans. On hearing that the Spain-based new numero uno was to come to India for a few weeks in summer with his wife, I fix a date.
A couple of days before the appointment, Aruna Anand calls, saying, “I am Mrs Anand. We have reached India and will meet you on Monday….” So it is that I find myself, ignoring the heat and humidity, flying out to the capital of Tamil Nadu. I tell the driver, waiting at the airport, to drive out to Neelankarai, where Anand’s in-laws live. We are to meet at their house since his paternal home is, as Aruna has explained, ‘under renovation’.

It’s a picturesque old home with a pretty compound and hearing me walk down the short driveway, Aruna comes to the door. Ushering me into the traditional living room – that opens off a small courtyard with a swing – she exchanges pleasantries and informs that Anand will be with us shortly as he is ‘training’. I sit down and notice the chessboard in the room that is a natural part of the décor.
In between sips of cooling mango juice, Aruna introduces us to her parents who stroll in and are justifiably – though unobtrusively – proud of their son-in-law. A flurry at the gate and Aruna dashes out as Anand reaches. In a striped blue and white T-shirt and trousers, he looks much younger – and less serious – than is his wont in the customary photographs off the circuit and the NIIT billboards that have dotted several metros.

As ‘India’s Mind Champion’ settles down at right angles to where I sit and Aruna too joins him, we start the conversation with his newfound success. “It’s difficult to explain what I felt…. My main aim was to win and in April I saw my name at the top of the list that was officially released,” he says softly. “I still feel like a teenager on the circuit though. When I started off there was a bonus for any player who defeated Karpov and Kasparov. Today, I am the man with the bounty on his head.”