ICCF Congress

Based on Congress approval of proposal 2022-030, the current ICCF withdrawal system will no longer exist. That means there will no longer be any newly recorded accepted withdrawals, silent withdrawals or unaccepted withdrawals other than silent; or their associated suspensions.

This change in rules will apply to all events on the ICCF server including ones already in progress, as at the time of implementation. Internal National events can still involve whatever their member federation internal rules dictate (in events not using “all ICCF rules”), but any desired withdrawals of players will no longer be conducted through an automated process.

From Nov 2022 onwards, players will be expected to manage their reflection time including circumstances where an accepted withdrawal was possible earlier. For example, one can use one’s allocated leave time in all standard time control events as a “personal insurance” in case one falls sick. If the player saves much of his leave time for that “just in case” scenario, he will almost certainly not be in danger of losing any games by exceeding a time limit (ETL) just because he became ill. Of course, one can manage the reflection time as one wishes without ETL.

(Editor’s note: ICCF uses many abbreviations. One of them is ETL which means Exceeded Time Limit)

If one wishes to see why this rule change has been made, please refer the 2022 Congress proposal 2022-030. (Go to the ICCF homepage, click on “ICCF Congresses”, then click where it says “Proposals” on a blue background following the “2022 Glasgow Congress” near the top.) The rationale is far too long to repeat here.

An accepted withdrawal is allowed when the situation requires a player to stop playing for a substantial period of time under circumstances considered reasonable. Such reasons include significant illness, injury, death, or circumstances beyond the player's control, such as war.

Based on Congress approval of proposal 2022-030, the following has been implemented on the server: A player who loses any game by exceeding a time limit (ETL) will now be restricted from registering for any new event on the server. The time period for that restriction is either 30 days or 90 days from the time of that ETL.

1. If the player is not already under such a restriction, then the time period is 30 days.
2. If the player was already under such a restriction (involving either a 30- or 90-day restriction) when the player's most recent ETL occurred, the restriction is for 90 days from the most recent ETL.

This rule change just went into effect.

WC in GM Norms

GM Hans-Dieter Wunderlich has now achieved 16 GM–Norms and is at the top of the All-time GM-Norm list and is now 2 norms ahead of the other players. He got his GM title in 2006. Once again lots of congratulations to the “World Champion in GM-Norms”!

This year titles were awarded at the Congress. Regrettably not many delegates were present to collect the players' awards. Those delegates who were not present or did not nominate a person to collect the awards have forfeited these awards; sadly they are not transferred to next year.

Bertl von Massow Awards

Alok Saxena was awarded Gold medal, but it was not collected. They are awarded respectively for 15 years (gold) and 10 years (silver) of faithful service to ICCF, as the delegate of a National Federation, as a Member of the ICCF Presidium, Commissions or the Zonal organisations, or as Tournament Secretary (Director) or a Team Captain of a highly placed team in the CC Olympiad or Continental (Zonal) team tournament.

AA/C18/Final, 18^th Africa Asia Zonal Championship Final

Om Prakash Mohanty is placed second (7^th after tie-break) with 6 points out of 12. One of his winning games is given below:

AA/C21/SF/A, 21^st Africa Asia Zonal Championship S-Final A

Mohan Turaga, Akkaraju Sailaesh Chandra and Anirudh Duttagupta are playing in this event. Both Mohan Turaga and Anirudh Duttagupta have scored 6 out of 10, have finished all their games and are placed joint 2^nd. They have qualified for the finals. The winning games of both players are given below:
(The frame below conains two games)

AA/C21/SF/B, 21^st Africa Asia Zonal Championship S-Final B

Alok Saxena, Lalit Kapoor and Ganesh Hedge are playing in this tournament. Alok Saxena has scored 6.5 out of 10 and is joint-winner with two others and has acquired an IM norm from this event. One of his winning games is given below:

Both Lalit Kapoor and Ganesh Hedge have scored 6 out of 10, but were placed 4^th and 5^th respectively. Alok Saxena and Lalit Kapoor have qualified for the finals. One of the winning games of Mr. Kapoor is given below:

AA/C21/SF/C, 21^st Africa Asia Zonal Championship S-Final C

Gautam De, Tanmay Srinath and Rabirashmi Roy are playing in this event. Gautam De and Tanmay Srinath both have scored 5.5 out of 9 and are placed 2^nd and 3^rd respectively and have good chances to qualify for the finals. Their games are given below:
(The frame below contains 2 games)

AA/TC04, 4^th Africa Asia Team Championship

India has fielded three teams in this tournament. India A is captained by A. Duttagupta, India B is captained by Alok Saxena and Africa Asia B is captained Ambar Chatterjee. India B is placed 2^nd at present with 26.5 points and 71% score while Indonesia C with 28.5 points is topping the table with 73% score.

Anil Anand has completed all his games on Board 3 for India A and is placed 2^nd while K. Prabhanandan (Africa Asia A) is 1^st. One game of Anil Anand on Board 3 is given below:

Champions League 2021 C7

Indian Stalwarts team consisting of Lalit Kapoor, Gautam De, Mohan Turaga and Tanmay Srinath are playing in this event. The team has 29.5 points with 61% score and is topping the table with 16 games ongoing and 296 games finished. Places 1-2 and the best four third places (after Tie-Breaks resolved) are promoted to B division in CL10.

Lalit Kapoor on Board 1 has scored 6.5 out of 12 and is placed 3^rd. One of his games is given below:

Champions League 2021 C7

Gautam De is playing on Board 2 and has scored 8 points out of 12 and is placed joint 1^st and has also acquired an IM norm. One of his winning games is given below:

K. Sasikiran is playing in World championship 44 Semi-finals and has scored 8.5 out of 16 and is placed 4^th. One of his winning games is given below:

USA 2021-A, USA Invitational 2021-A

Abhijeet Gupta scored 6 out 12 in this tournament and topped the table and acquired several norms in one go: SIM, IM, CCM, CCE norms here. One of his games from this tournament is given below:

WLS/Inv/9, WCCF 9th Invitational

Abhinjeet Gupta scored 7 out of 14 and acquired IM, CCM and CCE norms. His one of the games is given below:

INDIA MEXICO match started on 30^th June 2021. The final score line is of 25.5-22.5 in India's favour with just last game of Amit Sharma ending in his win. His game is given below:

India-Cuba match started on 28^th Nov. 2021

India has lost big big by 27.5-41.5 margin. One of the games from this match on board 3 is given below: