Nihal Sarin was crowned champion of the 2026 Tata Steel Chess India rapid tournament at Kolkata, on an emotionally-charged final day for Nihal after the passing of his maternal grandfather – who had taught him the sport – after a prolonged illness, on Thursday night.
“He was the one who taught me chess, he taught me how the pieces move, he is the sole reason why I got into chess in the first place,” Nihal said on the chess.com live stream. “When I was five, I used to be a very restless kid, and my grandfather introduced me to chess to make me calm down a bit, and that’s how it started. He absolutely loved the game, so I want to dedicate this title to him.”
It is the second time in his career that Nihal has won this rapid tournament (after 2022) and this time, he wasn’t even supposed to be here. He was called in as a last-minute replacement after world champion D Gukesh had withdrawn from the tournament a week before its start.
After that, he’d only scored 1.5 points in three rounds on the opening day. He came roaring back after that, with four wins in the remaining six rounds, and two draws. One of those draws was in the last round against Viswanathan Anand, when Nihal only needed a draw to seal the title, and he did that with utmost professionalism, not giving Anand a chance in that final round.
“Second day fortunately went quite well for me. The games went up and down. All that matters in chess is who makes the last move, and luckily on that second day, it wasn’t me,” Nihal said.
“On Day 1, I prepared for the games for five minutes, but on Day 2, I didn’t even do that,” he said, when asked if he’d changed anything in his routines after a difficult opening day.
Despite his wins against Hans Niemann, Volodar Murzin, and Vidit Gujrathi on Day 2, Nihal only came into the final day with the joint lead, because the legendary Anand was having a fine tournament himself. The decisive win on the final day came against Wesley So, after Nihal drew against Praggnanandhaa, but Anand himself said that just for how Nihal converted his endgame against Gujrathi on Thursday, he deserved that title.
Nihal himself was, naturally, full of admiration for Anand, and how he had played throughout this tournament. It was, in fact, Anand’s loss to Arjun Erigaisi yesterday – where he threw away a position of serious strength – that brought Nihal into contention to win the title. Throughout the tournament, Anand had managed his time superbly, got into great positions, and scored some excellent wins, but he just fell short in the end, even if Nihal later admitted to being mind-blown by the five-time world champion’s level.
“I’m absolutely not surprised that his class is very much visible, that class is permanent. For him to do this at his age is mind-blowing. But for me, everything he does is mind-blowing,” Nihal said.
This is just another superb result in what has been a period of Nihal climbing up the ladder across all formats. Last month, he won the President’s Cup in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. It was a result that saw him breach the 2700 rating mark in classical chess and moved him up into the top five Indians on the classical rating list, surpassing Gujrathi, and left him only behind Erigaisi, Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa, and Anand.
Following that, he played very well at the World Rapid & Blitz Championships in Doha at the end of December, and only just missed out on a spot in the knockout rounds of the blitz tournament. He needed to beat Arjun Erigaisi in the final round there, but only managed a draw, which meant he finished just outside the top four.
With this reminder of just how good he is, particularly in the faster time controls, Nihal Sarin has made a great start to 2026, as chess begins a new cycle towards the 2028 World Championships, where he would no doubt want to be in the mix for that elusive Candidates spot.
