D Gukesh wins World Chess Championship: How father Rajnikanth played a crucial role in building Indian GM's career

Dommaraju Gukesh, the newly-crowned world champion, is one name that will dominate not just the Indian chess scene, but the sporting arena globally. While it would feel like Gukesh has been in and around the chess fraternity for a while for someone who has been following his career closely, his World Chess Championship title triumph over China's Ding Liren is only the beginning . After all, Gukesh is just 18-years-old , and has etched his name in chess history at such a young age. None of this, however, would have happened without the support of parents, especially his father Dr Rajnikanth.

Sure, as he revealed on Thursday after his historic win , Gukesh has had an ensemble supporting cast that include the like of Viswanathan Anand, P Harikrishna, Paddy Upton and so on, but for the teenager, probably no one would come close to supporting him as much like his own father. This was evident from the fact when a tearful Gukesh hugged his father shortly after is triumph. Because sometimes, emotions can speak louder than words. And that certainly was the case on Thursday.

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🇮🇳 World Champion Gukesh D receives his trophy and immediately passes it on to his parents! 🥰#DingGukesh pic.twitter.com/sLJVTWujbR

— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) December 13, 2024

Those were not just happy tears any two people would share. Those were tears of joy as a father’s proud son overcame all obstacle in life to script history. Rajnikanth is an Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) surgeon, whereas Gukesh’s mother, Dr Padma, is a microbiologist. Rajnikanth, however, quit his job in 2018 to travel with his son for several tournaments. and eventually his mother became the lone earner in his family. Gukesh’s family struggled financially too, between 2017 and 2018, so much so that they had to rely on his parents’ friends to sponsor money to ensure he got to participate in tournaments.

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The year 2017 was also around the time when an 11-year-old Gukesh took his first steps towards achieving stardom in chess. “We were not a very well-off family, so they had to face a lot of financial struggles. But I did not realise it at that time. At some point in 2017 and 2018, we were running so low on money that my parents’ friends sponsored me. My parents had to make many lifestyle changes just for me to play tournaments. They made the most sacrifices,” Gukesh said at the post-match press conference on Thursday.

The new World Champion… Gukesh D! 🇮🇳♟️🏆#DingGukesh pic.twitter.com/Y6tbl0CwPh

— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) December 13, 2024

Gukesh was right. His parents did sacrifice a lot to help achieve their son’s dream. This is not the first time Rajnikanth has been travelling with Gukesh for a tournament. In fact, he has been doing this since 2017, and though it was initially easy for his father to travel with him, financial difficulties meant Gukesh faced obstacles in achieving his dream.

Gukesh and his family, though, would overcome those obstacles with a brave face

“When he started chess career, it was easier. In the beginning, I could work, and then in weekends, I could make time for weekend tournaments. But once he started gaining ratings, and we had to travel abroad, one of us had to accompany him for tournaments to continue practice. I took the duty of travelling and my wife took the duty of supporting the family,” Rajnikanth told RevSportz.

“Both of us were doctors, but when we were both practicing we had a decent salary. Once we started having the need to travel abroad, half of the month I wasn’t working, and we had to travel on both my expenses and Gukesh’s expenses. From 2017-2019 we were struggling and we were exhausting our savings and resources. We were doing it because he was close to becoming a GM. We just wanted to give him more exposure and travel to a lot of European tournaments. During the pandemic, we were not travelling. I was working full-time, my wife was also working. We got our financial things sorted out,” he added.

At just 12 years and seven months, Gukesh became the third-youngest Grandmaster in chess. This was in 2019, a time when his family was financially struggling. But post-COVID-19, the Gukesh we know, was born. It took less than half a decade since then for Gukesh to dethrone Viswanathan Anand as India’s top-ranked chess player , in 2023. And this year, a year where he won the Candidates , the Chess Olympiad gold, and now the World Championship, has been his best year yet. But, none of this would have been possible without his family’s sacrifices, as well as the hard work and commitment that Gukesh himself has put into achieving success.