International bridge event from today

The 14th HCL international bridge championship gets under way in the capital from Wednesday with over 600 participants expected to be part of the congregation. The championship, which ends on Sunday, October 23, will also see 12 international teams including the US, Israel, Poland, UK, Russia and Jordan among others and 90 teams from India in the fray.

The total prize purse up for grabs at the five-day event is Rs. 1.2 crore ($180,000), among the highest for any bridge tournament in the world.

The championship is being held under the auspices of the Bridge Federation of India and comes on the heels of the Olympic Committee of Asia announcing the inclusion of bridge in the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia.

Players of international repute participating include Giorgio Duboin from Italy (world ranked 4), Zia Mehmood from USA (7) and Italy’s Norberto Bocchi from Italy (9) among others. The championship will consist of the team of four gold, team of four silver and open pairs events. The Naresh Tandan Trophy will be given to the winners of fours gold event. the Mohini Tandan Trophy to the winners of fours silver event and the Neena Bonarji Trophy to the winners of the open pairs.