Chess
Fact Check - It is Dommaraju Gukesh, not Donnarumma
Once Gukesh became the youngest to defeat world champion Magnus Carlsen, the Indian media erupted, albeit with a wrong name. The prefix 'D' in his name went from Dommaraju to Donnarumma.
D Gukesh (Source: FIDE)
Indian teen chess Grandmaster D Gukesh has been on a tremendous rise over the past few months. The 16-year-old was one of the stars of India's bronze-medal winning campaign at the Chess Olympiad earlier this year.
Gukesh, on Sunday, also became the youngest player to defeat the Norwegian GM Magnus Carlsen during his long reign as the world champion. He went past fellow Indian R Praggnanandhaa's record in the process.
Moreover, Gukesh is also the second-highest rated chess player in India currently only behind former World Champion Viswanathan Anand.
While Gukesh seem to be doing all the right things over the chess board, the media off late has been getting his name incorrect.
Once Gukesh achieved the feat of becoming the youngest to defeat Magnus Carlsen, the Indian media erupted, albeit with a wrong name. The prefix 'D' in his name somehow went from Dommaraju to Donnarumma in multiple reports.
It all started with a ANI report which mentioned him as Donnarumma and was carried by multiple organisations, including the NDTV, The Print, News18 amongst others.
A simple google search for Gukesh now also pops up an article 'Who is Donnarumma Gukesh?'.
This error from the Indian media also went international as CNN carried a copy titled "Indian teenager Donnarumma Gukesh becomes the youngest ever player to beat Magnus Carlsen as a world champion."
But, how did Dommaraju turn into Donnarumma?
Well, the only explanation to this seems to be that someone, somewhere confused Gukesh to the Italian footballer Gianluigi Donnnarumma, who plies his trade for the Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) alongside the likes of Lionel Messi and Neymar Jr.
Dommaraju Gukesh is a Indian superstar, with the potential to rule world chess. He is frequently in top-20 players of the world. He is the youngest to defeat Magnus Carlsen during his reign as a world champion. He is a an individual gold medallist in the Chess Olympiad. All this at the age of 16. The least we can do is get his name correct.
