Abhijeet Gupta surges ahead

Abhijeet Gupta surges ahead
By Gopakumar

Grandmaster and former champion Abhijeet Gupta surged ahead of the field defeating young GM Murali Karthikeyan in the fifth round of Commonwealth Chess Championship now underway here.

With his fifth victory on the trot, Gupta maintained a clean slate and it was another clean effort from the BPCL-employee. For the records, it was a Catalan opening wherein Karthikeyan faltered and Gupta got an early advantage. In the middle game, Karthikeyan lost an exchange and thereafter Gupta was at the top of his game despite meeting stiff resistance.

The other overnight leaders could not win which means Gupta is solely leading the tables with five points from as many rounds. There are just four more rounds remaining in this 298-players championship.

On the second International Master Arghyadip Das played it safe with white pieces and held Grandmaster M R Lalith Babu to a draw while on the third Himanshu Sharma enjoyed some advantage before taking a draw with Grandmaster Sahaj Grover.

Defending champion Deep Sengupta put it across Niaz Murshed of Bangaldesh to join the ranks of those who have 4.5 points and share the second spot. Apart from Sengupta, Grover, Sharma, Das, Babu, Ankit Rajpara and Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh share the second spot.

In an unfortunate incident, Grandmaster Koneru Humpy withdrew from the tournament after losing on time against Himanshu Sharma. Humpy had not heard the Arbiter’s statement on the opening day clearly and was unaware of the time-control in-force here.

She appealed against the Arbiter’s decision but her appeal was turned down by the appeal’s committee comprising the participants of various countries. Humpy then decided not to continue the event.

In the women’s section International Master Padmini Rout seems to be going ahead as she took her tally to four points in all.

Important Results Round-5 (Indians otherwise stated) :- GM Abhijeet Gupta (5) beat GM Karthikeyan Murali (4); IM Arghyadip Das (4.5) drew with GM Lalith Babu M R (4.5); IM Himanshu Sharma (4.5) drew with GM Sahaj Grover (4.5); GM Deep Sengupta (4.5) beat GM Niaz Murshed of Bangladesh (3.5); GM Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh (4.5) beat GM Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury (3.5); Visakh Nr (4) drew with GM Deepan Chakkravarthy J (4); GM Abhijit Kunte (4) drew with IM Akash G (4); Harsha Bharathakoti (4) drew with IM Narayanan S L (4); GM Ankit R Rajpara (4.5) beat Sekar B (3.5); IM Saptarshi Roy (4) drew with Sanjay N (4); Athul Krishna S (4) drew with GM Sriram Jha (4); GM Aravindh Chithamabram Vr (4) beat Dhanjay (3); Ajay Krishna S (3) lost to IM Padmini Rout (4); Michelle Catherina (3) lost to IM Mohammad Minhaz Uddin of Bangladesh (4); WIM Ivan Maria Furtado (3) lost to IM Rathnakaran K (4);Srinath Rao S V (3.5) drew with IM Ramnath Bhuvanesh (3.5); GM Laxman R R (3.5) drew with Dhulipala Bala Chandra Prasad (3.5); IM Ravi Teja S  (4) beat Majumdar Chandrasish (3); Iniyan P (3) lost to IM Akshat Khamparia (4); Vignesh Nr (4) beat Lokesh N (3).