Battling eyedrops mistake, depression: How UP chess whiz Shubhi Gupta became India’s No. 1 girl

Shubhi Gupta (special arrangement) NEW DELHI: Imagine it’s your first international chess tournament. Your parents burned a hole in their pocket to take you to the picturesque country of Uzbekistan. There, it is assumed that you will play with the toughest opponents from around the world. You reach the place and sit down at the gaming table. But once the game starts, your vision blurs and the 64 squares in front of you are barely visible. Totally depressing, right?Shubhi Gupta, who became the girls’ world No. 4 and India’s No. 1 earlier this month, was just 15 when she had to go through a similar experience last March. It is hard to understand what she must have felt at that moment. “This was her first personal international tournament outside India. She had previously traveled to Sri Lanka, Georgia and other countries, but those trips were for qualifying for official events like the World Cup. Uzbekistan was her first independent international tournament,” said Shubhi’s father Pradeep during an exclusive interview with TimesofIndia.com.“She could barely see well on the board because we accidentally got the wrong eye drops. They gave us a 1% solution at the health store instead of 0.1%; it was 100 times stronger than the one we normally use. It completely affected her vision, making everything blurry for seven to eight days. As a result, her entire first tournament in Uzbekistan in March was ruined because she just couldn’t see the board.”Just last month, the same Shubhi Gupta was playing in Germany, taking part in two strong IM tournaments there and earning an impressive 184 rating points to climb 37 places to become world No. 4 in FIDE’s Girls Ranking, which consists only of players aged 20 and under.While her rise may seem rapid, it certainly hasn’t been without its hiccups.

A school hobby soon turns into a lockdown grind

Shubhi, now 16, got into chess at the age of eight as a simple hobby in her school’s chess club. After securing third place in an inter-school competition, her interest grew, prompting her father to enroll her in a weekend academy.In 2019, barely six months into the serious game, she took part in her first major event, the Under-9 National Championship in Ahmedabad. She finished in an impressive 10th place and opened her initial FIDE rating at 1070.Then the pandemic hit. For most kids, lockdown meant screen addiction, but for this wizard from Ghaziabad, chess became her only friend in isolation. In 2020, with her rating still sitting at a measly 1095, her family approached coach Prasenjit Dutta from Delhi.“She was totally immersed in chess all the time,” Dutta told the website, smilingly reminiscing about the old days. “Whatever study material I gave her, she worked on it immediately. She was missing the basics at first, so we worked incredibly hard on them. I was just waiting on God’s timing and thinking, ‘When will the lockdown end? When will the overboard tournaments come back?’

Shubhi Gupta with Prasenjit Dutta (right) and Bharat Singh Chauhan (left) (special arrangement)

During the lockdown, Shubhi dominated the online circuit, winning gold in the Under-11 National Schools Championship, bronze in the 2021 Under-14 National Championship and individual and team gold in the West Asian Under-12 Championship.Because she was a new face tearing up online tournaments, whispers and speculation about fair play arose from skeptics. But Dutta knew it was pure hard work.

Bringing glory to Ghaziabad

When over-the-board tournaments returned in 2022, Shubhi silenced any remaining doubters. She won the National Amateur Championship (under-2000 category) and followed it up with a gold medal at the Under-12 National Championship in Mandya, near Bangalore.India’s chess infrastructure and prodigies have traditionally been concentrated in the south. By bringing the national trophy to Ghaziabad, Shubhi marked a rare breakthrough in junior chess for North India and Uttar Pradesh in particular.“It was the first time that the national title came back to North India,” recounted Pradeep. “It was a huge success and boosted everyone’s morale.The national title qualified her for the 2022 Cadet World Championships in Batumi, Georgia. There, representing India against players from over 70 countries, Shubhi secured the gold medal and became the world champion.

Shubhi Gupta on the Prasenjit Dutta Academy wall (special arrangement)

“My dream has always been for a student to become a world champion,” Dutta said. “I stayed up all night watching her matches live. Her moves were coming in at around 98-99% accuracy. Best engine recommendation, that’s what she was playing. For a player at that age to play virtually error-free was a huge leap in strength.”

Trust of trustees

There is no denying that elite-level chess is an expensive affair. Father Pradeep works in IT to finance the trip. Shubhi’s mother Urmila, who initially did not know a single rule of the game, gradually transformed into her daughter’s full-time training partner, analyst and traveling companion.With Shubhi’s elder brother completing his final year of engineering, the family sees playing chess as a bonding activity. If someone is free, they prefer to move a piece or two around the board. However, Shubhi and her mother spend almost 80% of their time away from home traveling for events.

Shubhi Gupta with her mother Urmila (special arrangement)

Sponsors have come forward to support Shubhi’s talent and ease some of the financial burden on the family. This support allowed the teenager to train under top grandmasters including GM Swapnil Dhopade and GM Srinath Narayanan.“They had a lot of faith in her,” noted Pradeep. “Srinath Sir was particularly keen to get her to play international open tournaments abroad as domestic opportunities can be limited at her level.

The art of reset

Late last year, the 16-year-old faced a serious mental hurdle at the women’s national championship in Durgapur, West Bengal. She played superbly and led the field until the final stretch before the pressure caught up with her.She lost the final two rounds and dropped to a heartbreaking fourth place. It secured a reward of 3.5 million rupees but offered no comfort; the lost national title sent her into a depressed state.“When it went wrong at the end, everyone was upset,” admitted Pradeep. “But we also grew up as parents. We scolded her badly after losses, but we learned to handle it better. This time we told her, ‘It’s just one match. It’s not the last tournament’.”However, the maturity shown by Shubhi in fighting this mental block was commendable.She completely separated herself from chess, turning to mandala art, sketching and movies. The mental break worked. Just days later, she traveled to Jamshedpur in Jharkhand for the Under-19 National Championship and won the title, completely erasing the spirit of Durgapur.Off the board, Shubhi displayed the same clinical focus in her academics, deftly balancing late-night tournament preparation with the intense pressure of passing her Class 10 board exams. “She prepared mostly through YouTube, talking to teachers and self-study. She scored 96% in one and a half months of preparation,” revealed her father.

A new beginning

After returning to Uzbekistan in March this year to cleanly secure her third Women International Master (WIM) standard, Shubhi and her mother traveled to Munich, Germany in May.In two back-to-back grueling international tournaments, Shubhi achieved a phenomenal double in the Woman Grandmaster (WGM) standard in the first event, followed immediately by a full International Master (IM) standard in the second.READ ALSO: R Praggnanandhaa Exclusive Interview: “Winning Against Magnus Carlsen Is Something I’ve Always Wanted”The performance catapulted her to India’s No. 1 ranking in the girls’ division. Remarkably, despite all the requirements being fully ticked off, the family chose not to officially claim the lesser title of WIM.“We didn’t claim the WIM title,” revealed Pradeep. “Her dream is not to stop here. She is aiming straight for the WGM, IM and eventually the absolute Grandmaster (GM) title. Her determination to excel at the highest level in the world right now is incredibly high.”