 "File image of Indian Grandmaster Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. PTI")
New Delhi: Raising a red flag over delay in issuance of visas to players competing in the prestigious Candidates event, International chess federation FIDE on Saturday enjoined Canada to process the applications at the earliest, saying there are “grave concerns” over timely arrival of contenders.
Canada is set to host one of the most prestigious chess tournaments from April 3-22 in Toronto, where five Indians, including two women players will also present their challenge.
The event will determine the challengers for the World Champion title in both the Open and Women’s Categories.
Prodigy R Praggnanandhaa, Vidit Gujrathi and Gukesh D have qualified for the eight-player, double round-robin men’s tournament while R Vaishali and Koneru Humpy will compete in the women’s event, which will be run simultaneously.
“Regrettably, players from various countries worldwide, who submitted their visa applications few months ago, have not yet received any updates on their status,” FIDE wrote on X, drawing attention of the Canadian government on the issue.
“With only a month remaining till the FIDE Candidates Tournament, there are grave concerns about the timely arrival of the players to Toronto.”
India’s five-time world champion and FIDE deputy president Viswanathan Anand re-tweeted the FIDE letter, tagging Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) .