This is the first 'World Chess Championship for the Blind' to be held in India. According to sources, as many as 150 participants, including 15 International Masters (I.M.), 3 International Women Masters (I.W.M.), 6 F.I.D.E. Masters (F.M.) and 30 F.I.D.E. rated players from 40 countries will be competing for the prestigeous title.

The tournament will be inaugurated on 9th October 2006 and will end with the felicitation of winners on 18th October 2006.

The tournament will consist of nine rounds and will be played under Swiss league system, as per F.I.D.E. (Federation Internationale Des Echecs, the world apex body for sighted) & I.B.C.A. rules. The rounds will be played everyday from 2 pm to 8 pm. The top eight games will be relayed on the website www.aicfb.org.

The top six players will represent I.B.C.A. as a team at the forthcoming sighted Chess Olympiad in December 2006.

Further more, this championship is also being seen as a platform for selection of the world team that will play the F.I.D.E. Olympiad (Federation Internationale des Echecs or World Chess Federation Olympiad) in Germany in the year 2008.

Chess is the only game where visually impaired players have the same rules as that of the sighted players with minor changes to the equipment.

Visually impaired players use a specially adapted board with raised black squares, a nail on the top of the black pieces and peg holes in the board to keep the pieces in place. (See November 2005, 'Eye News').