By Arvind Aaron
There are more Indian men in the FIDE rating list than Russian men. In the latest, August 2017 rating list, there are 56497 Indian men, which is more than Russians who are 55946.
However, in the combined list of men and women together, Russia is ahead at 67976 to 66163. In the events registered to be organised, Russia has 237 events to India’s 63. Scanning the events, Russia has it evenly split among classical, rapid and blitz ratings while majority of the Indian events are classical.
India has the most rated players among the English speaking nations for the past two decades. India had more Grand Masters than China recently.
India top 10: Anand 2783, Harikrishna 2743, Vidit 2693, Sasikiran 2688, Adhiban 2677, Ganguly 2658, Negi 2656, Gupta 2639, Sethuraman 2618, Gopal 2589.
India women top 10: Humpy 2557, Harika 2526, Eesha 2397, Tania 2392, Vijayalakshmi 2370, Mary Ann 2344, Aakanksha 2328, Padmini 2327, Vaishali 2327, Soumya 2320.