Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran of Chennai will become the fifth Indian chess player to receive the prestigious Padma Shri Award on January 26, 2015, at Delhi during the Republic Day celebrations.
Padma Shri is the fourth highest civilian award in India. The latest big assignment of Sasikiran is he is one of the trainers of five time former world champion Viswanathan Anand.
Sasikiran, 1981 born from Chennai had won the Indian National Premier Chess Championship title four times. He has spearheaded the Indian team to gold medals in the Asian Games at Doha 2006. He has been a team man and helped India win the bronze medal in the Tromso Chess Olympiad 2014 and also in the quadrennial World Team Championship at Basra, Turkey 2009.
Krishnan Sasikiran
Sasikiran has received the Arjuna Award in 2002. That is another prestigious award which is decorated only on sportsmen. He has represented India in all Chess Olympiads since Elista 1998. He has played in the World Chess Championship’s 128-player knock out and has at best been in the last 16.
His father, S Krishnan is a former chess player and has represented Reserve Bank of India in chess. Krishnan was also a noted trainer having trained Sasikiran and Grand Master Sundararajan Kidambi.
Sasikiran will become the fifth chess player to receive the award after Anupama Abhyankar (Gokhale) 1986, Bhagyashree Sathe (Thipsay) 1987, Viswanathan Anand 1988 and Koneru Humpy 2007. Sasikiran is employed with ONGC, a large Government owned Petroleum refining company.
