Chennai, playing host to the Commonwealth chess championship for the first time, will see 435 players from 16 nations in action at Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium from November 22 to December 1.
Soviet born Sergei Tiviakov, presently living in Groningen in the Netherlands is the top seed.
He and second seed Grandmaster Ahmed Adly of Egypt are eligible for prizes but not the Commonwealth titles as Holland and Egypt do not fall under the Commonwealth category.
Matches from 20 boards will be broadcast live on the internet.
Besides Commonwealth titles for men and women, there are also award for Under-8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18 and 20 boys and girls.
There are 17 Grandmasters and 28 International Masters in the fray.
“We are happy to sponsor chess, said Dr V Natarajan on behalf of the title sponsors, Apollo Engineering College.
In such a strong line up of players and with only 40-50 unrated players, it will become a norm opportunity event for the Indians, said Prof R Anantharam, chief arbiter.
At the end of the meet the press, the Tamil Nadu State Association presented four of the five medal winners from the World Youth Chess Championship that concluded at Maribor in Slovenia on Sunday.
M Mahalakshmi, R. Vaishali, both gold medal winners, Aravindh Chithambaram, silver medal and Monnisha, bronze medal winner were present and AICF President J.C. Prabhakar congratulated them before the photographers took over.