Vishy Anand glad World Champion Gukesh is promoting chess in India like he did

Viswanathan Anand is glad that recently crowned World Chess Champion D Gukesh is doing a lot of promotional events in India. The five-time world champion said it was important to endorse the responsibility of promoting the game, which comes with winning the title and is happy that Gukesh was doing it.

"If you complain about the responsibility that comes with the title, then you probably shouldn't try for it," Anand said as he joined the FIDE broadcast of Round 5 of the Women's Grand Prix in Nicosia, Cyprus.

Anand remembered 'travelling like crazy for two weeks' after he won his first world title in 2000. Fortunately for him, he managed to get himself busy with chess immediately afterwards as he wanted to prepare for the Wijk aan Zee tournament that followed.

"Gukesh is also very popular," Anand said with a smile. The former World No. 1 didn't see much of an issue in Gukesh getting busy with seemingly endless promotional events since clinching his world title in Singapore last December by defeating China’s Ding Liren. "Essentially, he's not played most of February and March, so then why not?" Anand said.

"You cannot neglect the public side of things. You cannot say, ' I want chess to be more popular,' and then when it is, you cannot just hide. It's one or the other, so you have to spend some time doing these public events. They are also important and will help chess and keep it in the public eye. So it is good he (Gukesh) is doing it."

Anand also won world championships in 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2012. He played two more title matches in 2013 and 2014, but lost to Magnus Carlsen on both occasions. The Norwegian has been World No. 1 since overtaking Anand in 2011.