Young chess prodigy’s record under cloud as complaint alleges unfair play

A week after a three-year-old from Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, entered global headlines as the youngest rated chess player in history, the remarkable feat is now mired in controversy.

A formal complaint to FIDE, the world chess federation, alleges that the child’s rating was secured through “clear violations of FIDE’s fair play principles” — a charge his family and coach strongly deny.

According to the complaint, all three opponents the boy defeated to earn his rating were coaches from the same Sagar-based academy where he trains. “It appears that the rating was achieved through unfair means… involving clear violations of fair play principles by the coaches or individuals supervising the games,” the complaint states.

FIDE, maintaining its standard confidentiality on such inquiries, neither confirmed nor denied that a probe is underway.

But the boy’s father, Siddharth Singh Kushwaha, and his coach, Nitin Chaurasiya, say they are aware of the allegations — and insist the accusation is a product of simmering factionalism within Madhya Pradesh’s chess fraternity. The state unit has been under an ad hoc committee for years, and internal rivalries, they argue, have now spilled into a global sporting controversy.

“In Sagar, there are two factions in the local chess body. One faction is trying to target the other by trying to prove my son’s record came by unfair means,” said Kushwaha.

The prodigious three-year-old had captured national attention for beating older and higher-rated players, including Abhijeet Awasthi (1542), Shubham Chourasiya (1559) and Yogesh Namdev (1696), across tournaments in Khandwa, Indore, Chhindwara and Mangaluru.

The complaint claims all three — Chourasiya, Namdev and Awasthi — are coaches at academies linked to the boy’s training ecosystem in Sagar. Both Kushwaha and the coach counter that claim, calling the overlap purely coincidental and asserting that the individuals coach at different academies in the city.

“Just because these people are from Sagar and we know them, it cannot prove there was anything unfair. They are like our competitors,” said Kushwaha, who runs Olympio Chess Club in the city.

The complaint also flags alleged irregularities at one tournament where the boy and Namdev joined after the computerized draw had been generated — their names were added manually and they were paired together, with the child ultimately winning. It further claims that Namdev lost due to running out of time after leaving for the washroom during the final minutes of a 10-minute rapid game.

The coach disputes this version, insisting the loss had nothing to do with a bathroom break. “It’s not just my son — there were other children, too, who reached late and were manually paired off,” Kushwaha said.

As FIDE weighs the complaint, the extraordinary ascent of a three-year-old chess sensation now stands overshadowed by sharp allegations, local rivalries and questions that could redefine how early-age ratings are monitored worldwide.