Indian blind chess team leaves for World Championship

New Delhi: A four member Indian team of blind players left for Serbia to take part in the World Chess Championship for the visually impaired scheduled at Belgrade from August 26 to September 4. The team comprising National Blind Champion Darpan Inani from Gujarat, Gold medalist at the 13th Chess Olympiad for the Blind in 2008 Srikrishna Udupa from Karnataka, Ashwin Makwana from Gujrat and Rajesh Oza from Maharashtra left yesterday. All these four players qualified by securing the top four places in the National A Chess Championship for the Blind held in Mumbai in April 2010, a release said. The team was flagged-off by Ravindra Dongare, vice-president of All India Chess Federation at Mumbai. "Past few years, performance of blind chess players are improved a lot and this time we have very good chance to improve on past performance," Dongare said. Total 121 players including 83 FIDE rated players from 36 countries are taking part in this prestigious event. PTI