Toronto: A major chess tournament scheduled to be held in Toronto, Canada, in April is in jeopardy as several contestants, including Indian star Praggnanandhaa R, are yet to obtain visas.
The 2024 Candidates Championship, organized by the International Chess Federation or FIDE, is scheduled to take place from April 3 to 23. The candidates for FIDE, known as “the most prestigious tournament in chess”, will determine the challengers for this tournament. Open and Women’s World Championship titles.
However, nearly 40 participants, including several of the 16 players, have yet to receive visas. They include Praggnanandhaa, Vidit Santosh Gujrathi, Gukesh D and Vaishali Rameshbabu. Vladimir Drkulec, president of the Canadian Chess Federation, told Hindustan Times that the only Indian player to have received a visa so far was Koneru Humpy. Federation Vice-President and former world champion Viswanathan Anand also has a visa.
Participants from four countries, including India, are waiting for travel documents. “If we are unable to resolve these issues by Friday, March 8, 2024, the match will be moved to Spain,” Delculec said in an email reply to inquiries on Saturday.
“This situation requires some political will from those in power to resolve it,” he said, adding, “I am cautiously optimistic that we will be able to resolve this issue before Friday’s looming deadline. Over the next few days I will do everything I can to bring attention to this matter.”
It comes after FIDE issued an urgent appeal on Friday, in which he said: “For the first time in chess history the most prestigious tournament will be held in Canada, acknowledging the country’s growing importance in the world of chess. Role. Unfortunately, players from around the world who submitted their visa applications months ago have yet to receive any updates on their status.”
The call was posted on X, tagged Marc Miller, Canada’s minister of immigration, refugees and citizenship, and his department. It added, “With just one month left until the FIDE Candidates Championship, there are serious concerns about the players’ ability to arrive in Toronto in time.”
“We have contacted several members of parliament and several government ministers and have received at least a positive response from their staff,” Delculek said.
FIDE Director General Emil Sutovsky said they “will not replace players or postpone events due to visa issues.”
“We have a strong team and enough resources to secure the same dates elsewhere. But our real focus now is Canada. A lot of hard work has gone into making Toronto an extraordinary event,” he added . Participants from four countries, including India and Russia, were affected, he said.
This will be the first time this nearly 70-year-old event is held in North America and will feature 16 of the world’s best players.
Delculek said he was grateful to “the people of India for the hospitality they extended to us at the 2022 Olympiad in Chennai and at the FIDE Congress, they were so kind.” However, he added, “I don’t like the idea of passing the rules for Canadians. The difficulty and bureaucratic frustrations of the process reaching India, my Indian friends assured me, are common even for people born in India and applying from Canada.”