Pranav Venkatesh (born 13 October 2006), also known as Buddy Pranav, is an Indian

chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

grandmaster and the 2025 World Junior Chess Champion.

Chess career

Pranav began playing chess at the age of 6, and had several coaches including Visweswaran Kameswaran. He obtained his first two GM norms at the Serbia Open in 2021 and in the Vezerkepzo GM tournament in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

in June 2022. In August 2022, Pranav obtained his final norm by winning the Limpedea Open in

Baia Mare Baia Mare ( , ; ; ; ) is a Municipiu, city along the Săsar, Săsar River, in northwestern Romania; it is the capital of Maramureș County. The city lies in the region of Maramureș, a subregion of Transylvania. It is situated about from Buchare ...

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championship, becoming the 75th grandmaster from India and the 27th grandmaster from the state of

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...

. In October 2022, he played for India in the World U-16 Youth Olympiad (alongside Pranesh M, Harshad S, Rohit S, Mrittika Mallick, and Boramanikar Tanisha S), alongside competing in the

Magnus Carlsen Sven Magnus Øen Carlsen (born 30 November 1990) is a Norwegian Grandmaster (chess), chess grandmaster. Carlsen is a five-time World Chess Championship, World Chess Champion, five-time World Rapid Chess Championship, World Rapid Chess Champio ...

Academy Challenge, winning both events. He later won chess24's Challengers Chess Tour by defeating

Raunak Sadhwani Raunak Sadhwani (born 22 December 2005) is an Indian chess grandmaster. A chess prodigy, he became a grandmaster at the age of 13. He is the 10th youngest player in history and the 4th youngest Indian to be awarded the title as of December 2023 ...

in the final round. In October 2023, he competed in the 38th edition of the

European Chess Club Cup The European Chess Club Cup is an annual chess tournament for club teams from Europe. It is organised by the European Chess Union. The competition is held with the Swiss system over seven rounds. It consists of two sections, open and women's, with ...

with Offerspill Sjakklub. Led by Magnus Carlsen, Offerspill Sjakklubb triumphed, after scoring a decisive last-round victory against Asnieres – Le Grand Echiquier (France). Pranav's overall performance of 5/7, including victories against

Jorden van Foreest Jhr. Jorden van Foreest (born 30 April 1999) is a Dutch chess grandmaster. He was Dutch Chess Champion in 2016, and won the Tata Steel Masters in 2021. Van Foreest is the No. 2 ranked Dutch player behind Anish Giri. Chess career Introduced ...

and Grigoriy Oparin in the last two rounds, earned him a tweet from the world no.1 Magnus Carlsen - "Pranav is buddy and buddy is Pranav". In January 2024, Pranav competed in the fifth edition of the Puzzles World Championships, hosted by chess.com, finishing 4th place overall. However, he produced the strongest resistance to eventual (5-time) winner

Ray Robson Ray Robson (born October 25, 1994) is an American chess grandmaster. He achieved the grandmaster title in 2010, at the time the youngest American player to be awarded the title by FIDE. Early life Robson was born in Guam to American father G ...

, achieving a score of 3-5 sets with an aggregate puzzle score of 416-430. In November 2024, Pranav won the Challengers section of Chennai Grand Masters and qualified to compete in main section of the event in 2025. Pranav won two golds in the Under-18 Open Rapid and Under-18 Open Blitz section at the FIDE World Youth Rapid and Blitz Championship held in Terme Čatež, Slovenia from 13th to 17th December 2024. Pranav won the

World Junior Chess Championship The World Junior Chess Championship is an under-20 chess tournament (players must have been under 20 years old on 1 January in the year of competition) organized by the World Chess Federation (FIDE). The idea was the brainchild of William Rits ...

held at

Petrovac, Budva Petrovac (, , ), also known as Petrovac na Moru (). Petrovac, is a small town in Coastal region of Montenegro. It is located on the coast between Budva and Bar, where the old mountain road from Podgorica reaches the coast is being the most fam ...

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on 7 March 2025 with a score of 9/11.. He became the fourth Indian to win the World Junior title after

Viswanathan Anand Viswanathan "Vishy" Anand (born 11 December 1969) is an Indian chess grandmaster. Anand is a five-time World Chess Champion, a two-time World Rapid Chess Champion, a two-time Chess World Cup Champion and a World Blitz Chess Cup Champion. ...

in 1987,

Pentala Harikrishna Pentala Harikrishna (born 10 May 1986) is an Indian chess Grandmaster (chess), grandmaster. He achieved a peak world ranking of 10 in November 2016, and a peak Elo rating system, Elo rating of 2770 in December 2016. On 17 August 2001, he bec ...

in 2004, and Abhijeet Gupta in 2008.

References

Living people 2006 births Indian chess players Chess Grandmasters Sportspeople from Bengaluru Chess Olympiad competitors World Junior Chess Champions {{India-chess-bio-stub