An eight-year-old British Indian schoolgirl has scripted history as she is bestowed to be the best female player at a European championship.
Bodhana Sivanandan, an eight-year-old schoolgirl from Harrow in north-west London, has made chess history after beating a master more than 30 years her senior at this year’s European Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship in Zagreb, Croatia. The little girl defies age barriers, surpassing seasoned grandmasters to secure the top position. Her excellence helped her win the “super talented” best female player title at the European championship. The chess world is praising her in awe.
To clinch the women’s first prize, the British Indian little girl secured 8.5/13 points in the 13 round-Blitz competition, which drew 555 chess players, including 48 grandmasters and 50 international masters. She earned 211.2 blitz ELO points to be crowned as the best player at the championship. With her incredible intelligence, the little prodigy defeated one international master (IM) and one FIDE master (FM).
The European Chess Union praised the “super-talented” girl, highlighting her achievements as “astonishing.” Irina Bulmaga, a Moldovan-born Romanian professional chess player, expressed her awe through a tweet on the “X” handle acknowledging Sivandan’s performance as an “unbelievable result by 8 yo girl-Bodhana.” In addition to this, Irina hailed the eight-year-old as a “phenomenon” in front of herself and a bunch of other experienced players.
In the penultimate round, Bodhan beat her first international master, Lorin D’Costa, 39, the England women’s coach. Later in the final round, the eight-year-old drew with Vladislav Nevednichy who won the Romanian Championship twice. By doing so, the wonder girl succeeded in avoiding defeat against any grandmaster in a competition.
She was offered the under-12 prize along with an acknowledgment of the top player of the English contingent. As per the rules of the championship, as it was a one-prize-per-player game, she chose the women’s award. Her overall tournament performance concluded with a rating of 2316 on Sunday in Zagreb.
On 28th December, 8-year-old Bodahana will be seen competing at the International Chess Congress in Hastings, one of the world’s longest-format tournaments.
Rishi Sunak invites Bodhana
This summer, Bodhana, the chess prodigy, was invited to Downing Street and there she was seen playing chess with British Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak. A young chess championship was hosted there.
It was just before making a new move of investing GBP 1 million. This investment aimed to back children attending schools in disadvantaged localities across England to learn and play chess. Apart from this, the British government has chalked out plans to inspire more school pupils, especially girls.
How Bodhana becomes a “phenomenon”
It was the coronavirus pandemic period when people kept themselves inside four walls. During this time, the primary school pupil grew interested in chess at the age of five. The story began when she found a chess board and pieces in a bag that was given by her father’s mate.
The little girl revealed that she wanted to emerge as a grandmaster and England’s youngest Olympic gold medalist.
