Ganguly, Humpy start off with victories in Nationals

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

Vishakapatnam, Apr 3 (UNI) Reigning champion Grand Master Surya Sekhar Ganguly and Grand Master Koneru Humpy got off to winning starts at the 43rd National 'A' Chess Championship for Men here today.

The 32nd National 'A' Chess Championship for Women also flagged off at the Swarna Bharathi Indoor Stadium here.

The men's championship began well for the top seeds with Ganguly and the Indian number two GM Sandipan Chanda scoring facile victories.

Ganguly playing with the white pieces faced the Classical Variation of the Sicilian Defence from the teenage International Master Abhijeet Gupta of Rajasthan. Within minutes of the start of the game, the players rattled moves and raced deep into the middle game.

When things seemed okay for the Black, Ganguly forced the exchange of Queens and demonstrated his superior technical ability in Rook and Minor piece endgame to seal the match.

GM Sandipan Chanda displayed good patience to win his Scheveningen Variation of the Sicilian defence game in 45 moves.

The National 'B' Champion GM R B Ramesh won a comfortable match over IM Dinesh Kumar Sharma from the white side of the Sicilian Taimanov Defence. Playing in copy book fashion, Ramesh neutralized Black's threat on his King and then using his space advantage swiftly maneuvered his major pieces to finish off the game in 35 moves.

IM Deepan Chakaravarthy got the better of Tej Kumar in a Caro-kan Defence game. Deepan skillfully promoted his outside passed pawn to gain his victory.

Meanwhile, GM Humpy, who chose to play in the men's section instead of the women, won against IM Arun Prasad in a game of scintillating fortunes but Arun Prasad failed to utilize his extra piece after Humpy lost her knight and allowed her to develop counter play. Prasad was forced to give back the piece and when Humpy threatened to promote to a Queen her opponent gave up.

GM Abhijit Kunte settled for a quick draw with IM Saptarishi Roy Chowdhury in just a dozen moves and less than half an hour after start of play, IM Lanka Ravi went down fighting to IM Kidambi after a marathon struggle lasting more than 110 moves.

In the women's championship, the first game to end was between sisters Vijayalakshmi, the top seed and Meenakshi, who called it a truce just after four moves.

The only woman Grand Master (WGM) who scored a full point was Swathi Ghate who defeated WGM Esha Karvade from the white side of the Sicilian Najdorf variation. Last year's runner up Mary Ann Gomes overcame former National Champion Anupama Gokhale in 51 moves in a Rook and pawn endgame.

Round 1 Results (Men) D P Singh (UP) (1) beat Himanshu Sharma (HP) (0) GM SS Ganguly (1) beat Abhijeet Gupta (RAJ) (0) IM S Kidambi (BPCL) beat (1)IM Lanka Ravi (0) IM Spatarishi Roy Chowdhary (Indian Rly) (0.5) Drew with GM Abhijit Kunte (Indian Oil) (0.5) GM Koneru Humpy (1) (AP) Beat IM S Arun Prasad (Oil India) Argyadip Das (Ind Rly) (0.5) Drew with B S Shivananda (0.5) IM MR Vebkatesh (BPCL) (1) Beat IM PDS Girinath (0) V Kamble (0.5) Drew with IM Sriram Jha (LIC) (0.5) IM J Deepan Chakkaravarthy (1) (TN) Beat MS Tej Kumar (0) (KAR) GM Sandipan Chanda (ONGC) (1) Beat GM Tejas Bakre (Indian Airlines) (0) GM R B Ramesh (Indian Oil) (1) Beat IM D K Sharma (LIC) Round 1 Results (Women) Nimmy George (KER) (1) Beat Swati Mohota (WB) (0) L Iswarya Shobana (TN) (1) Beat Soumya Swaminthan (MAH) Kiran Mohanty (ORI) (1) Beat Alka Das (WB) (0) Amruta Mokal (MAH) (1) Beat J E Kavitha (TN) (0) Swathi Ghata (LIC) (1) Beat Esha Karvade (MAH) (0) Mary Ann Gomes (WB)(1) Beat Anupama Gokhale (BPCL) (0) Supriya Maji (0.5) Drew with WGM Nisha Mohota (Oil India) (0.5) Aarthie Ramesh (IA) (0.5) Drew with D Harika (0.5) (AP) S Vijayalakshmi (IA) (0.5) Drew with S Meenkashi (IA) (0.5) UNI XC PM PC2254

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