Making the right moves
Chess queen Tania Sachdev is always at the helm, be it the black-and-white squares of the chessboard or the varied hues of life
Poised to excel Tania Sachdev finds men more rationalPhoto: Shanker Chakravarty
A ppearances can be deceptive. As Tania Sachdev walks into an upmarket restaurant, her moves are akin to a svelte model sashaying down the ramp. No wonder, she proved to be a darling of shutterbugs at the just concluded Fashion Week in Delhi where she walked the ramp for designers Sanjana Jon and Ashima-Leena. There is every possibility of the photographer getting carried away all over again as one turns the discussion to the moves the 23-year-old is really known for. “I don’t fit the image of a chess player that people have in mind. I don’t come from a conservative family and as long as my family is with me and I am delivering results, nobody should mind,” says the woman grandmaster, who topped the Asian championship last year.
Tania agrees it is not just her fashion statements that put her in a different league. “I have always been a hyperactive child. It is only at the chessboard that I find my balance. I don’t meditate as much as I should. And when I am free, which is hardly the case, I want to try 20 different things.” Tania recalls how her parents introduced her to chess. “They were trying different ways to make me sit at one place. Chess happened to be one of them. None of them played chess at any level.”
The world realised her forte earlier than she herself did. “I have been playing and winning since the age of eight but I realised the importance of what I was doing when I won the Under-16 Asian Championship in Tehran. “When the national anthem was played, I felt for the first time that I love…More
