Koustav Chatterjee becomes 10th GM in Bengal and 78th in India

Koustav Chatterjee became the 78th Grandmaster of India in the new year. The youngster from Kolkata increased the number of GMs in the state to ten by drawing with GM Mirtabha Guha, who also happened to be Bengal's last and ninth GM, in Round 10 of the National Chess Championship in New Delhi. Since the Covid epidemic, the 19-year-old boy's life has quickly transformed. The youngster realised how important it is to have a clear mind and a strong body throughout the lockdown. He started doing daily workout to lose about 50 kg and his obese appearance. On the chess front too, things started to happen just when he thought of focusing more on his studies and seriously working on becoming an IAS officer, as per his mother Babita's wishes, who is a state government employee. He scored almost 95 per cent marks in his Class 12 board examination earlier this year. After lockdown, Koustav achieved his first GM norm in the Sheikh Russel GM's meet in Bangladesh in October 2021. In the first week of November2022, at the Asian championship, he followed it up with his second GM norm. After passing the 2500 Fide magic rating in August 2022, he was waiting for his third norm. He said "I feel I could have become a GM earlier if I could have participated in some overseas tournaments. But I waited for my opportunity." He was Introduced to the game by his father Kalyan, Koustav and instantly attracted to it as he started playing in 2010. He earned his International Master (IM) title in 2019 but his father could not see his son make the next grade as he passed away last year.