Billionaire Nikhil Kamath apologises for taking help from 'people analysing the game, computers' to win charity chess match opposite Vishy

Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand played a game of chess with billionaire Nikhil Kamath, on Sunday, during a charity event as part of the month-long Checkmate Covid programme.
However, after the chess grandmaster resigned when his opponent had just seconds left on the clock. Hours later, a flurry of reports claimed that the Zerodha co-founder had manipulated the game to register a win.

According to news agency ANI, the All India Chess Federation (AICF) Secretary Bharat Chauhan said it is "unfortunate" to see unfair methods employed in a charity chess game, and termed it as a "bad" move by Kamath, saying that it shouldn't have happened.

The competitive chess platform chess.com, also banned Kamath for violating its 'fair play' rules, after the event.

The 33-year-old startup founder took to Twitter to share a statement apologising for taking help from "some people and computers" for the game.

"Yesterday was one of those days that I had dreamt of when I was a really young kid learning chess, to interact with Vishwanath Anand. Got the opportunity thanks to Akshaypatra and their idea of raising funds for charity conducting a bunch of chess games with Vishy. It is ridiculous that so many are thinking that I really beat Vishy in a chess game, that is almost like me waking up and winning a 100mt race with Usain Bolt," Kamath said in the statement.

He went on to add, "I had help from the people analyzing the game, computers, and the graciousness of Anand sir himself to treat the game as a learning experience. This was for fun and charity. In hindsight, it was quite silly as I didn't realise all the confusion that can get caused due to this. Apologies."


Responding to the move by Kamath, Anand told The Economic Times via email, “It was a celebrity simul with people who have an understanding of chess that showed in their level of play. During this particular game, I suddenly felt the level of chess go up a few notches. I resigned because it is distasteful to flag a person in a simul. You do that in a competitive game if need be.”

On being asked if he felt the startup boss had cheated, the chess champion said, “Chess playing servers like Chess.com take fair play seriously and use algorithms to flag cheating. I will accept that the server was right in doing so.”

He, had also addressed the issue in tweet, saying that he "just played the position on the board and expected the same from everyone."

"Yesterday was a celebrity simul for people to raise money It was a fun experience upholding the ethics of the game. I just played the position on the board and expected the same from everyone," Anand wrote.


Kamath apologised to the grandmaster again, responding to his tweet.

"In my head, it was just a fun game we amateurs were playing against the greatest chess champ from India to raise funds for charity. But still gives no excuse for what I did. It was wrong and I sincerely apologize," he wrote.


The tournament also saw Aamir Khan, Riteish Deshmukh, Ananya Birla, Manu Kumar Jain and Yuzvendra Chahal play for a cause.