AICF All India Chess Federation
The national governing body of chess in India — administers the Indian Championship, oversees state federations, and represents India at FIDE.
The All India Chess Federation was founded in 1951, six years before Viswanathan Anand was born and decades before chess became a mass cultural force in India. The federation administers the Indian National Championship, the National Junior and Schools Championships, and the qualification cycle for Indian players to international events. Headquartered in Chennai — the historical Madras, Anand’s home city and the centre of Indian chess for the past four decades.
The Current Era
Indian chess has gone from one grandmaster (Anand, 1988) to over 90 GMs as of 2026 — most of them under 30 years old. The country won the open Chess Olympiad in 2022 and 2024, and as of 2025 has three players in the world top fifteen (Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa, Arjun Erigaisi) plus the long-established Vidit Gujrathi and Pentala Harikrishna. The AICF has been the operational vehicle for this transformation, working in close partnership with the WestBridge–Anand Chess Academy on talent development.