Outdoor Gariahat Chess Club in Kolkata

Rain or sun does not bother them, neither does the cacophonous traffic nor the incessant clamour of a packed city. Their dream is to get World champion Vishwanathan Anand to visit their “club”, the concrete railing under a busy flyover where a clutch of chess aficionados concentrate on games over which rulers once traded kingdoms.

For the 80-odd members of the Gariahat Chess Club, the love for the game transcends everything else — weather, traffic, crowds — as masters and novices come together to play the game of kings right under the busy 570-metre- long Gariahat flyover in south Kolkata.

“I’ve been playing chess here since my childhood, even before the flyover was constructed. This area was our favourite meeting place. As more and more people joined us and some even ventured out to participate and win prizes in various tournaments, an idea began to take shape — that we should form a club,” Gariahat Chess Club president Debashish Basu told IANS.

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