“Heh, heh,” he would grin, with heavy emphasis on the ‘h’s. “All good. We are all set for this edition of the event. But I won’t tell any individual representative of the media who the star attraction is. You all will know in due course,” Soumen Majumdar, who passed away in the early hours on Wednesday, used to say. He was perhaps India’s first and only star organiser of chess events.
Even today, internationally-rated events in India are few and far between. Back in the 1980s and 90s, they were non-existent. Majumdar almost single-handedly delivered the Goodricke Open for over two decades. It was the only platform for Indian players to rub shoulders with foreign Grandmasters and earn rating points. The other route for getting those norms was playing abroad. Those days, hardly a handful of Indian players could afford that.
Majumdar, who breathed his last in Kolkata at the age of 69, was the face of that tournament. Usually, it was a happy face, which hid the last-minute tensions of finalising sponsors, arranging travel and accommodation for foreign and Indian players, thrashing out other logistics and coming up with a tournament of top quality in terms of organisation.
Several top players took part in it. Former world champion Vasily Smyslov, world championship challengers Viktor Korchnoi and Nigel Short, Garry Kasparov’s second Yevgeniy Vladimirov to name a few; the who’s who of Indian chess those days including Viswanathan Anand and Dibyendu Barua, the next generation of K Sasikiran, P Harikrishna, Suryasekhar Ganguly, Sandipan Chanda. It’s an endless list. The standard was so high that no Indian won the title. Hardly anybody ever raised questions about the management part.
“The rest of India learnt chess oragnisation from Soumenda, including me,” Barua told RevSportz, after returning from the crematorium. “That a chess event could be so professionally organised in India was unheard of before him.” Several representatives of the West Bengal chess fraternity including Chanda, GM Neelotpal Das and IM Nisha Mohta were there to pay their final tributes.
“He was one of the greatest promoters and true enthusiasts of chess in India. A visionary and passionate organiser, Soumenda played a pivotal role in shaping the Indian chess scene during the 1980s and 1990s, when international exposure was rare and difficult to come by for the Indian players. His relentless efforts gave Indian players a platform to showcase their talent and gain invaluable experience,” Barua wrote on social media.
It’s difficult to explain now what this event meant for Indians. In the 2000 edition, Abhijit Kunte attained his third and final norm to become a GM. Playing against him in that game, Chanda secured his first. Majumdar was instrumental in running the Goodricke Chess Academy and Alekhine Chess Club, which was the cradle of chess in Bengal and produced GMs like Ganguly, Chanda and Das.
“Soumen Majumdar was one of the most enthusiastic organisers,” Anand posted on X. “He always thought big and was passionate about the game. When I landed in Kolkata after winning Regio Emilia, the motorcade from the tarmac to my hotel is a memory that is one of my most cherished. The Goodricke events were a landmark event in those. Indian chess lost one of its greatest supporters. His smiling face and enthusiasm will always be special.”
Majumdar also orgnaised the Asian Individual Championship in Kolkata in 2003. He served the All India Chess Federation as its treasurer in the early years of this millennium. A man who approached the difficulties with a smile and came out with a look of greater satisfaction on his face, Majumdar is survived by his wife and a son. In his death, Indian chess lost a friend.