CCA offices meet Bansal to seek support for inclusion of chess in UT Gradation List(chandigarhsportsnews.blogspot.in )

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Chandigarh Sports News Blog

Chandigarh: 27 Aug
Prof. Anil Raina, Chairperson and Dr. Vipnesh Bhardwaj, Secretary Chandigarh Chess Association (CCA) called on Mr Pawan Kumar Bansal, Member Parliament and Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs & Water Resources on Sunday to seek his valuable support for the cause of inclusion of chess in the Sports Gradation List of UT Chandigarh. They requested Mr Bansal to impress upon the UT Administration to examine the issue sympathetically.

During the interaction with Mr Bansal, Prof Raina informed the Minister that perhaps Chandigarh was the only UT/state in the country where chess did not form a part of the Gradation List of the Sports Department. He also apprised Mr Bansal of the fact that chess was in the ‘Priority A’ category of the Union Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports and it has already been provided Gradation by the Punjab Government. In Tamil Nadu, Chess has been included in the regular school curriculum, they informed.

Dr Bhardwaj informed the Minister of the various problems being faced by the chess players of the city due to non-gradation of Chess in the city. CCA also provided the Minister a copy of the Memorandum signed by nearly 85 parents of the chess players of the city.

It was brought to the notice of the Minister that Chandigarh has a large pool of very promising chess players, who were, unfortunately moving over to other games due to the fact that Chess did not find a place in the Gradation List of UT Chandigarh. He was also informed that Indian players were consistently bagging international medals in this game, which is now played in over 160 countries of the world.