Abhijit starts favourite in 35th National Junior chess

New Delhi, Aug 23 (UNI) Grandmaster norm holder Abhijit Gupta (BP) starts favourite in the Parsvnath 35th National Junior chess championship that gets underway here tomorrow.

As many as 195 participants from across the country will be part of the boys and 21st edition of the girls' championship being organised simultaneously said Bharat singh Chauhan, secretary of the Delhi Chess Association.

It however will not be easy for Abhijit Gupta, who recently made a Grandmaster norm in the Andorra International open chess tournament. His main challenger are Arghyadip Das(Bengal) and Woman Grandmaster D Harika who has decided to opt the open section this time.

Also in the fray are G Rohit of Andhra Pradesh besides double IM norm holder S P Sethuraman and double IM norm holder G N Gopal.

Overall around 130 participants in the open section will vie for a coveted berth in the next world junior championship from here -- an honour awarded to top three participants. In addition there are also places up for grabs in the next Asian Junior championship that will also be held here in November.

In the girls' section IWM Mary Ann Gomes starts as the favourite.

The other notable participants in this section are former National under-11 girls champion Devangi Patankar and Soumya Swaminathan (Maharashtra), Saheli Nath (Bengal) and Orissa's Padmini Rout.

The championships will be played over 10 rounds in the boys' section and there will be 9 rounds amongst girls. The organisers will follow FIDE's Swiss rules.

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