Abhimanyu Mishra: 12-year-old Indian-origin boy on the verge of becoming youngest-ever GM

Having already achieved the world's youngest International Master (IM) status, 12-year old Abhimanyu Mishra now has his eyes set on becoming the world's youngest Grand Master (GM). However, he will face a race against time to do so as he has less than four months to achieve this target. Mishra has already won two of the three required GM norms in consecutive events and is closing in on the final one. However, along the way, he faces financial stress to raise funds for competing in tournaments.

Chess news: What does Abhimanyu Mishra need to become the world's youngest GM?

In order to achieve a GM title, a chess player has to touch an Elo rating of at least 2500 and pick up three norms. For a norm, a player is required to play against at least two players from national federations other than his own and a minimum of 50 percent of those opponents should be players with a minimum Elo rating of 2380. Abhimanyu Mishra, who is a part of the Kasparov Chess Foundation's Young Stars programme, currently has an Elo rating of 2473 and needs at least 27 Elo points to get to the 2500 mark.

Abhimanyu Mishra's dad's outlook on his son breaking records

Hemant Mishra, the father of 12-year old Abhimanyu Mishra, is well aware of the challenges that come across for a child who is so young and looking to make a name for himself amongst the greatest of chess players in the world. Hemant said, "He broke the youngest National Expert record by six months, and then he took down the IM record too. In the long run, these records may not mean anything but the belief he'll draw from chasing down these goals will stay with him for life."

Chess news: Abhimanyu Mishra chases Sergey Karjakin's record

At the mere age of just 12, Indian American Abhimanyu Mishra has already broken a number of records. Mishra holds the record for being the USA's youngest national chess master at nine years, two months and 17 days. In late 2019, Mishra also went past Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa's record to become the world's youngest IM at 10 years, nine months and three days. And now he is chasing the GM record currently held by Russian GM Sergey Karjakin. 

Karjakin achieved the youngest GM status at 12 years and 7 months, and his record has stood for a staggering 19 years. While several young Indian chess prodigies have come close to breaking the record, none have been able to crack it so far. Dommaraju Gukesh came within touching distance of the record two years ago, eventually missing the mark by 17 days. All eyes will now be on Abhimanyu Mishra, who has time until September five to get there.

GoFundMe: Abhimanyu Mishra is looking for corporate sponsors

Despite the glittering success that Abhimanyu Mishra has achieved at such a tender age, the 12-year old has no corporate sponsors. As a result, his family is running a fundraising appeal to cover future tournament expenses. The GoFundMe page titled "Support Abhi to become youngest GM in the world" has so far successfully raised close to $14,000 in contributions.

The family has reportedly spent roughly INR 2 crore (approximately US$ 270,000) on Abhimanyu Mishra's chess journey so far. Speaking of the struggles to finance his son's chess journey, Hemant said, " Despite him being the world's youngest IM, we haven't had luck with sponsors. We weren't even looking for anything big, just enough to cover tournament expenses. We applied for at least five scholarships. All of them were rejected. The whole model appears to be skewed in favour of those trying to get into Ivy League colleges. We were told to wait eight years so that he's of college-going age and someone 400 points below Abhimanyu was picked. That's when I gave up and decided to put out a GoFundMe campaign to raise money."