Bipin Shenoy - The untold story of the accomplished gentleman
For a sport to function properly, it takes a lot of professionals to play their role. While most of them remain unsung heroes or very few people get to know about their contribution to the game, Shahid Ahmed took it upon him to start a podcast where his intention is to bring stories of various chess professionals whose stories are not widely known. In the first episode of Straight Talk with Shahid - we bring the journey of Bipin Shenoy, a National Team champion, nine times National 'B' player, a multifarious chess personality who has played the role of a player, coach, mentor, journalist, coordinator and much more. He interviewed Smyslov, Korchnoi, Anand, worked with Kasparov Chess Club and was instrumental in strengthening the foundation of some of the strongest title players of Kolkata, West Bengal. Photo: Shahid Ahmed
Straight Talk with Shahid #1 - Bipin Shenoy
In a new series titled, 'Straight Talk with Shahid', a talk show/podcast which is aimed to bring the untold story of various chess personalities from the chess universe who is an accomplished chess personality, someone who has a lot of stories to tell but the world is unaware of them. In the first episode we have Bipin Shenoy who shares his multifaceted journey in chess with us. He has won the National Team Championship in 1984 along with Dibyendu Barua, Neeraj Kumar Mishra, Ananda Kumar Ghosh and Rajendra Singh. He qualified for nine consecutive National 'B' from 1983-91.
"I was born in Pune but I am here in Kolkata since six months after my birth. I started chess by watching my father playing chess with his Tamil friend who was posted in Russia. When he came, he used to play with my father. I learnt the game by watching them play. That was in 1971 when Fischer was at his peak. I was hooked to chess by the time Fischer played with Spassky in 1972." - On his first footsteps in the chess world.
He got his first chess book from the book stalls near Grand Hotel Kolkata famously known as Grand arcade. He got it for ₹30 or less at that time.
"We had State B and State 'A'. Our State 'A' used to go on for 22-25 days. It was 20-player Round Robin event... We had two rest days" - on chess scene when he used to play in State 'A' and 'B'.
He was among the first students of Alekhine Chess Club which has countless World Champions and World Class players participating in the iconic and one of the first international GM tournaments in the country back in the day - Goodricke International GM tournament which has witnessed players like Vishy Anand, Nigel Short, Daniel King, Viktor Korchnoi, Jonathan Speelman, Vladimir Akopian and many more legends of the game. He played and worked in the iconic tournament as a chess journalist where he had his first work as a chess reporter recommended by the Secretary and the backbone of Alekhine Chess Club - Soumen Majumdar.
He represented the first Indian team at Bangladesh from Alekhine Chess Club and since then the relationship between two chess playing only moved from strength to strength. Although he could not perform up to his expectations in his debut but it was a historic feat back then nevertheless.
"I scored 6.5/11 and got 2330 rapid rating because the average rating was quite high." - On getting his first rapid rating in a round-robin tournament where many players were above 2350 rated.
He was felicitated by former Vice President of India Late Mohammad Hidaytullah at Maharashtra Niwas, Kolkata after winning the Piloo Mody Chess Championship at Lucknow in 1983.
Mr. Shenoy has interviewed Smyslov, Korchnoi, Anand, Harikrishna, Edward Gufeld and many more legends of the game.
He reported for the English daily newspapers - The Telegraph, The Statesman, Times of India and one of the oldest daily newspaper Amritabazar Patrika.
He also taught Surya Sekhar Ganguly, Sandipan Chanda and Neelotpal Das in their formative years.
He was also instrumental in Mary Ann Gomes becoming a strong and accomplished player. Her father Charles Gomes is a great friend of Bipin.
Bipin was the first person to have started chess in various schools across Kolkata and he has taught in more than ten schools. He still teaches at Future Hope School where he teaches the underprivileged children. He also interacted with English cricketers like Kevin Pietersen and others when they visited the school and hosted friendly chess event with the school's students.
He also has a full time job with New India Assurance where his entire office supported him in his pursuit of chess despite not having a sports quota job and presently he is one of the senior coaches at DDDBCA.
Don't miss absolutely packed 80+ minutes of debut episode about the man who knows four languages English, Marathi, Hindi and Bangla, where you get to hear a lot about this man's journey in chess.
Watch the entire episode here
You can also listen to the podcast on: Breaker, Google Podcast, Overcast, Pocket Casts, Radio Public and Spotify.
Bipin Shenoy's best games
If you know about an accomplished chess professional whose journey in chess is not widely known, please let us know his name and details in the comments, we will try our best to bring his/her story to the world. You can also write to us here: teamchessbaseindia@gmail.com
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@ 29/09/2020 by Shahid Ahmed (en) |