International stars galore in Parsvanath Chess tournament

New Delhi, Jan 10: 400 participants from 20 countries will vie for honours in the sixth edition of the Parsvanath International Chess tournament to be played here from January 12-20, 2008 at Modern School Barakhamba Road.

The prize money for the tournament has been raised to a record Rs 10 lakh.

Indian challenge will be lead by Grandmaster and national champion Surya Shekhar Ganguly and will be amongst the favourites to win the title in a competitive field boasting of 15 Grandmasters and over 40 other titled players.

Prominent Grandmasters in the fray are Commonwealth champion R B Ramesh, Elizbar Ubilava, the famous Georgian trainer of Viswanathan Anand who is now residing in Spain and working with quite a few Indian Grandmasters.

The top seed will be Ghaem Maghami Ehsan of Iran and the other Iranian GM in the fray is Mahjoob Morteza. Ziaur Rahman will be the Bangladeshi challenge in the 10-rounds event while Grandmaster Igor Kurnosov will represent the Russian interest.

Besides, there are three Grandmasters from Uzbekistan - Saidali Iuldashev, Marat Dzhumaev and Safin Shukhrat.

Delhi's Sahaj Grover, the former under-10 world champion will be looking for a repeat performance after the recently concluded Commonwealth championship where he made his maiden IM norm.

As a run up to the event, the Delhi Chess Association has planned a gala and exhibition matches between Grandmasters and some of the budding youngsters and enthusiasts of the country.

The exhibition wherein four Grandmasters will play with 100 players, will be held at the tournament venue on Saturday.

UNI