Chess in India is growing at a great pace. We currently have over 50 grandmasters and 95+ International Masters. There are local tournaments organized regularly and the number is increasing day by day. We need quality arbiters in order to take care of the growing number of tournaments. For this reason The All India Chess Federation and FIDE Arbiters’ Commission with the support of Government of India's Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports organized a FIDE Arbiter's Seminar which was held at Hotel Royal Park Resort, Manali, from 9th to 11th March 2018. Gopakumar Sudhakaran was the chief lecturer and he sends us this report with a very interesting case.

It is clear that chess in India is booming. The number of players taking up the sport is growing each and every day. In such a scenario, it is important that quality trainers are created in the country. With an aim to ensure that coaches get the right guidance AICF along with Sports Authority of India have put in place the FIDE Trainers' Seminar to be held at different parts of the country from time to time. From 4th-6th March, GM R.B.Ramesh and IM Vishal Sareen interacted with the coaches in Mohali. There were also 30 talented kids who received training from these excellent coaches. All in all a great initiative by AICF, SAI, Ramesh and Vishal Sareen.

The top seeded Iranian team Rasht, registered a convincing 4–0 victory over Dubai in the final round to win Asian Cities Team Chess Championship 2017 and clinch the Dubai Cup with 16 match points. Team Bhubaneshwar finished second and Dhaka had to settle for the third spot. It was yet another feature in the cap of Kalinga Institute of Information Technology (KIIT), the premises where this world class tournament was held. We have pictures, final standings and board prize winners.

Going into the penultimate round, Deepan Chakkravarthy annihilated Himanshu Sharma's king in a Sicilian Paulsen. With this win, he has not only moved to the sole second spot but has also earned the right to fight for the title prize against tournament leader Swapnil Dhopade in the final round. On board 3, GM RR Laxman gave his opponent no chance, consuming only 52 mins for the entire game. In the final round, twelve players will be fighting for the nine qualification spots into the National Premier Championship and two for the title prize. An exciting finale is on the cards!

Asian Cities 2017 is being held in the Kalinga Institute Campus, Bhubaneshwar from the 26th of August to 1st of September 2017. Rasht from Iran is the top seed with the local KIIT team being the second seeds. Twelve teams are taking part in this event. Five teams are from India: KIIT, Bhubaneshwar, Kolkata, Puri, Cuttack and Bhubaneshwar, while we have six International teams from Iran, UAE, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Oman, Palestine and Chinese Taipei. We have round one report.

The game between two Caro Kann experts Lalith Babu and Swapnil Dhopade was drawn on the top board. Himanshu Sharma also couldn't break through the defences of Aravindh Chithambaram. This meant that Swapnil still leads the tournament with 9.5/11, but four players are on his heels with 8.5 points. Apart from Himanshu and Aravindh, they include Deepan Chakravarthy and Debashis Das. There are only two rounds left for the tournament to end and nine spots at stake for National Premier 2017. It's heating up!

After scoring eight wins out of his nine games, Swapnil Dhopade decided to make a quick draw in the 10th round of the 55th National Challengers, Ahmedabad. Two of his other teammates from Railways, Ravi Teja and Himanshu Sharma, were pitted against one another on board two. They also drew their game exactly after 25 moves as Dhopade had done. On one hand, this result let Dhopade get away with his quick draw and maintain his lead, while on the other, it gave Lalith Babu MR the opportunity to join Himanshu in the second place. After sweating blood against Mary Ann Gomes in an 85 move long battle, Lalith succeeded. We have a report with games and pictures.

Having registered another victory to his name, GM Swapnil Dhopade seems to be running away with the title this year at the 55th National Challengers, Ahmedabad. In round 9 he played against the much lower rated Udit Kamdar. Although Swapnil was the clear favourite in this matchup, the youngster really cracked the whip before giving away the full point. Report with pictures, games and analysis.

Having jointly led the tournament almost all the way through, GM Himanshu Sharma dropped down from the pedestal after suffering a loss against GM Lalith Babu MR in round 8 of the 55th National Challengers. His teammate with whom he was leading the event before this round, GM Swapnil Dhopade, continued to impress and convincingly defeated SL Narayanan in 35 moves. Report with games, analysis and pictures.

After a quick draw against each other in round 6, GMs from team Railways, Himanshu Sharma and Swapnil Dhopade, continued slaying the field and won their games on board one and two respectively. While Himanshu annihilated the overnight co-leader, Sammed Jayakumar Shete; Dhopade vanquished the tournament's top seed, Aravindh Chithambaram. On the other boards, Akash PC Iyer, Udit Kamdar and Nikhil Dixit tickled the fancy of the spectators by upsetting their higher rated opponents. Full report with games and pictures.

It was a turbulent day at the Karnavati Club in Ahmedabad where rounds 5 and 6 of the 55th National Challengers were underway. Seven out of the top ten games finished with decisive results in the fifth round while the sixth round witnessed four decisive games. The most spectacular game of the day featured the Bengali WGM Mary Ann Gomes yet again. But this time around, she was not on the sunny side of the of the result as she blundered mate in one in an equal endgame.

Perfect scorers were chopped down from seventeen to just six in the fourth round of the 55th National Challengers. The round witnessed some nail-biting action: Mary Ann Gomes won the day with her instructive endgame against GM Deepan Chakravarthy; GM Abhijit Kunte squeezed a win out in a seemingly drawn endgame against Arjun Erigaisi; while players from team Railways showed no mercy beating down their own teammates on the top two boards. A report with pictures and games from Ahmedabad.