Seventeen-year-old chess Grandmaster (GM) P Iniyan on Monday completed a 72-hour marathon chess event involving about 45 hours of play and 271 games to raise Rs 1,21,199 towards COVID-19 relief. Iniyan has played 271 games overall, winning 250, losing 12 and drawing nine.

While the funds will be shared between Tamil Nadu Chief Minister's Relief Fund and PM Cares Fund, Iniyan, on his own, has contributed Rs 20,000 for the welfare of his home district Erode.

"It was a different experience playing different kinds of players one after another and also playing continuously," Iniyan, who is coached by K Visweswaran, told IANS over phone from Erode. "I played against the players in the order of their registration, on a first-come-first-play basis. There was no segregation of titled and non-titled players," he said.

Taking into consideration the various time zones from where the players would log in, Iniyan's chess marathon began on Friday afternoon. "He was continuously playing except when he went to bed late in the night and while having a quick bite," Iniyan's mother P Saranya told IANS.

This event not only gave an opportunity for chess enthusiasts to play against a Grandmaster while staying at their home, but also helped them to contribute to a cause. All the games were played in the Blitz time control (3 minutes and 2 seconds increment for each player). When the players came online, Iniyan challenged them one by one.

The event was hosted by technology partner Internet chess club, an online chess portal which not only provided the platform to conduct the event, but also created a live page that viewers could watch from. Chess players from all over India, US, Australia, the UAE, Germany, Denmark, Scotland, Kuwait, Singapore and Switzerland participated in this event. The Indian players hailed from 11 states - Tamil Nadu, Bengal, Maharashtra, Goa, Andhra, Kerala, Telangana, Karnataka, Odisha, Uttarakhand, and Rajasthan.

Many titled players and personalities showed their support for this event including Arena Grandmasters (AGM) P Harikrishna, B Adhiban, Arvind Chidambaram, Harika Dronavalli, and many more.

(With inputs from IANS)