AICF to host 10 FIDE trainer seminars in 2025

New Delhi, Jul 16 (PTI) The All India Chess Federation (AICF) will conduct 10 FIDE trainer seminars this year and one in January 2026.

The trainer seminars, aiming to empower the Indian chess coaches for training all levels of growing talents, will start from Vijayawada in August and will cover a host of Indian cities before finally culminating in Ranchi in January 2026.

"For the first time ever, we are witnessing a national federation organising 10 FIDE Trainers' Seminars in a single calendar year — and remarkably, a proposal for the 11th seminar has already been submitted for January," said Sami Khader, the chair of the TRG (FIDE trainers commission).

"This outstanding initiative by the All India Chess Federation (AICF) is a testament to their unwavering commitment to developing chess trainers and raising the bar for training standards across the region.

"The FIDE Trainers' Commission (TRG) would like to emphasise that this is not only a record-breaking achievement but also reflection of the strong, ongoing collaboration and mutual trust between AICF and TRG." AICF head of operations, A K Verma said the initiative is a part of producing trained coaches, who can provide quality coaching to budding chess players. "We have been trying to provide a lot of training support to our coaches and give them the best available training so that they can use the knowledge to train students in their respective academies, institutes, personal coaching as well as in schools," said Verma.

"For the past could of years, the AICF has been organising five such seminars and from five to 10 is a big leap forward, we just hope more and more coaches join to reap the benefits of this initiative." Verma also added that he hoped schools will also take cognizance of the importance of having properly trained trainers/teachers with a valid training certificate coming from the apex world body.

Top Indian coaches, FST and Dronacharya awardee R B Ramesh, head coach Indian team N Srinath, head coach Indian women team Abhijit Kunte, GM Pravin Thipsay and GM Tejas Bakre have confirmed their participation as coaches for these seminars.

Schedule: Vijayawada August 8–10; Madurai August 22–24; Kottayam September 12–14; Pune September 19–21; Jaipur September 26–28; Noida, November 14–16; Kolkata November 28–30; Guwahati December 5–7; Bengaluru December 19–21; Ahmedabad December 26–28; Ranchi Januaru 23–25. PTI Cor SSC SSC SSC