Bridge Building

A high-profile international tournament in delhi reveals a thriving global subculture of cerebral—and passionate—card players from all walks of life.

- Devangshu Datta

Triskaidekaphobia. Fear of the number 13 is so all pervasive that it has its very own dictionary entry. Hotels refuse to have the 13th floor, vehicle owners pay to avoid the numbers 13 or, even worse, 1313 on their number plates.

However, there is one global community that doesn’t subscribe to that superstition. The game of bridge revolves around the supposedly unlucky number and bridge players contemplate the number as a matter of course. They count up to 13 constantly, using groups of four numbers like 5-4-3-1, 4-4-3-2, 7-4-1-1, 4-3-33, 6-4-0-3. The best bridge players are the ones who can calculate swiftly and then communicate their counts accurately to partners.

About 600 bridge players met in Delhi recently to showcase their skills at the HCL International Championships. The winners took home $180,000 (over Rs 1.2 crore) in prize money between them. The event drew several world champions and participants from across countries because it is one of the highest prize money events.

There is a reason why very few people will play bridge on Diwali—it is not a gambling game. The format of tournament bridge further reduces luck to an absolute minimum. The same hand is played out at hundreds of tables and the scores compared. Think of it as hundreds of people trying to solve the same logic and maths problems, while trying to prevent other people from solving them.