‘I have no idea about such a medal. Never got one,’ says Surya Shekhar Ganguly, the national chess champion between 2003 and 2008.
Kindly note the image has been published only for representational purposes. Photograph: Kind courtesy 07Berlin/Pixabay
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“What?! The Milind Kibe gold medal for the national chess champion? Silver medal for runner up? I haven’t heard of any gold or silver medal being given for the national chess champion or runner up.”
This is the response one gets from a couple of former national chess champions.
One of the sons of the medal donor too wonders about the fate of the gold medal donated by his father to the All India Chess Federation (AICF).
Not only the gold medal, even the status of the silver medal for which Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) had donated money is not known.
BHEL’s Trichy unit had donated Rs 2,000 to the AICF with a condition that the amount be invested and the income therefrom be used for a silver medal to be given to the national runner up.
The minutes of the AICF’s central council meeting on February 11, 1981 clearly mentions the receipt of Rs 2,000 from BHEL, Trichy, a former official said.
Several AICF officials do not know about the Milind Kibe gold medal donated by Vitthal Ramachandra Kibe (V R Kibe) way back in 1955 and the silver medal sponsored by BHEL.
“I will check and come back,” says AICF President Nitin Narang.
AICF has already faced the embarrassment of losing the Gaprindashvili Cup that India won at the 44th Chess Olympiad in Chennai in 2022.
Named after the Georgian chess Grandmaster and former women’s World chess champion Nona Gaprindashvili, the Cup is given to the nation’s teams that shows combined supremacy in the Open and Women’s sections in the Olympiad.
The Indian Open and Women’s teams won the bronze medal at the Chennai Chess Olympiad. In addition, India won the Gaprindashvili Cup for the first time in 2022.
The AICF had to make a replica of the Gaprindashvili Cup and gave it to the International Chess Federation or FIDE.
The Indian chess teams with their splendid performance brought back to the nation the replica.
In a letter dated June 16, 1955 to the medal donor V R Kibe, the AICF mentioned that the gold medal has been insured with the Oriental Fire and General Insurance Company Ltd.
Since then several national chess champions were awarded the Milind Kibe gold medal and its replica in silver.
“The national chess champion will be awarded the gold medal which has to be returned to the AICF. However a replica of the medal but made in silver will be given to the national chess champion,” says Ajay Kibe, V R Kibe’s son.
“The family doesn’t know about the fate of the gold medal. My father had given the gold medal and the die to AICF. I was very young in 1955. I was in touch with the AICF for some time. Later my brothers and I became busy with our careers and forgot about the medal,” Ajay Kibe, who lives in Indore, says.
V R Kibe, his son recalls, was a chess player and a great lover of the game who decided to donate the gold medal in 1955 in memory of his eldest son Milind Kibe who died at the tender age of nine in 1954.
“We had a silver replica of the medal. Later I met International Master Akshat Khamparia and started talking about the family’s interest in chess and the medal donation by my father,” says Ajay Kibe.
“From Indore, my father used to travel to play in chess tournaments. He died at the age of 66 in 1985,” the son adds.
For several generations the Kibes have lived in Indore.
One of his forefathers, Ajay Kibe says, brought about a truce between the Holkars — the rulers of Indore — and the British when the latter ruled India.
The Holkars rewarded the Kibe family with tracts of land.
While donating the medal, V R Kibe had made it a condition that a player who wins the national chess title for three consecutive years can retain the gold medal.
Otherwise, the gold medal would be returned to the AICF and a silver replica to be awarded to the national chess champion.
India’s first IM Manuel Aaron and Grand Masters Pravin Thipsay, Viswanathan Anand and Surya Shekhar Ganguly have won the national title three years consecutively.
“I have no idea about such a medal. Never got one,” says Ganguly, the national chess champion between 2003 and 2008.
Says Aaron: “The story of when this medal disappeared from AICF records in 2022 is recorded in Indian Chess History published in 2014. Nobody other than me ever spoke about this medal as they felt frightened to take up the matter.”
Will the cash rich AICF now revive the tradition of awarding a medal to the national title winner by making a replica of the gold and silver medals is a question that the chess body has to decide.
Venkatachari Jagannathan can be reached at venkatacharijagannathan@gmail.com
Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com
