Salvation in seven

Kreeda game boxes are scotch taped nowadays. Good move! The open boxes invariably meant missing and broken play pieces. The downside being you can’t try before you buy. Dahdi sells at `250, and turned out to be a great buy. The

box helpfully said “In a Line”, and that was enough to convince me I wouldn’t go wrong.
There are other similar games from Kreeda. Kattam Vilayattu is available in levels 1 to 3, promising varying degrees of difficulty, as the play surface gets larger, and the permutations more complex.
Dahdi builds on the “three coins in a row” idea, and with every such vertical or horizontal row made, you get to remove one of the opponent’s coins. Seven such eliminations and you’ve won! The nine shells each, are played alternately on vacant spaces on the canvas play mat. Once all the shells are on the board, movement is one step at a time. It turns out you don’t have to wait long for elimination to begin. With three shells still to be placed, the first row had been formed. It was an abrupt blow, felt like a quick fire goal, before the football team had even found their rhythm! An elimination later, I started seeing the pattern. Diagonal moves are not allowed. You cannot always block the making of rows of three. The pace is urgent. You will lose coins. The trick is not to lose your head, and like in all such games, to plan ahead!
The tacky rules sheet reveals Dahdi is commonly played in Andhra Pradesh. The state is a veritable treasure trove of fabulous strategy games, and Kreeda certainly seems to have cornered the business of their restoration into the main stream.
The author may be contacted at arup_kavan@yahoo.com [1]