Chess Grandmaster claims Hikaru accused a young prodigy of cheating amid allegations

Chess Grandmaster Srinath Narayanan claims Hikaru accused a young prodigy of cheating amid his own cheating allegations. 

Chess Grandmaster and Kick streamer Hikaru Nakamura has been embroiled in cheating allegations over the past weeks as a fellow GM, Vladimir Kramnik, claimed his Chess.com blitz rating records were suspicious. 

As the allegations between Nakamura and Kramnik go back and forth, other questionable acts from Nakamura have come to light as Nakamura has a history of also claiming other players were cheating. 

In a tweet by Chess Rumors, an anonymous player claimed Nakamura had once threatened to track down a young 14-year-old Andrew Tang – who would go on to become a Grandmaster – after he had scored 20% against him in a match. 

When a commenter pointed out Hikaru had also done this to GM Arjun Erigaisi and other Indian players after losing to an opponent, GM Srinath Narayanan corroborated the claim. 

“Can confirm that – true story about Arjun,” he said in his tweet. “Young Arjun was obviously rattled by the baseless accusation and felt bad about it, but thankfully it did not break his confidence or deter his progress.” 

Narayanan did not confirm if there were other Indian players who had been privately accused by Nakamura of cheating, and neither has Nakamura addressed the claims.

This comes as Nakamura criticized Kramnik for deleting comments defending him in Karmnik’s Chess.com posts accusing Nakamura’s win streak. 

Nakamura said in a recent video discussing the allegations, “Someone doesn’t get to say these things without actual proof. They don’t get to falsely accuse people over and over again without having to pay a price.”