Swapnil shares lead @ IIFL Wealth Mumbai International Open Chess

Swapnil shares lead @ IIFL Wealth Mumbai International Open Chess
By.R.R.Vasudevan

Grandmaster Elect Swapnil S Dhopade and top seeded Shardul Gagare (both Maharashtra) led the field along with several others after the second round of the IIFL Wealth Mumbai International Open Chess Tournament 2016 held at Mount Litera School International, Bandra (East), Mumbai here today.

Top seeded Shardul exploited the back rank weakness of  Shelke Sankarsha effectively, wrapping the point in 27 moves. Sharing the lead with Maharashtra duo at 2.0 points were International Masters Stany G A, Himanshu Sharma, Vikramaditya Kulkarni, Nitin S, Akshat Khamparia among others.

In upsets of the day, two International Masters viz., S Ravi Teja and Dinesh Sharma shed half points to Shah Manush and Ojas Kulkarni respectively.

In the IIFL Wealth Mumbai International Juniors that began late last evening, top seeded FIDE Master Mohammad Fahad Rahman of Bangladesh had an easy first round. Rahman scored a quick win over over Kriish Mehta. Other top seeds Sadhwani Raunak, Sankalp Gupta, D Gukesh, Aditya Mittal and Mendonca Leon Luke scored equally easy victories.

Earlier, best game of the day for round 1 in the IIFL Mumbai Junior International was awarded to Mendonca Leon Luke of Goa – an exciting DVD compliment, thanks to ChessBase

This 171 player nine round International Junior event, has the participation of players from six countries and runs till 5th Feb, 2016.

IIFL Wealth Mumbai International Results (Round 2) Shardul Gagare (2) bt Sankarsha Shelke (1), D Gukesh (1) lost to Swapnil S Dhopade (2), G A Stany (2) bt S Adhithya (1), Swapnil Kothari (1) lost to S Nitin (2), Sharma Himanshu (2) bt Parnali S Dharia (1), Shah Manush (1.5) drew with Teja S Ravi (1.5), Khamparia Akshat (2) bt Siddayya Gavi (1), Kulkarni Ojas (1.5) drew with Dinesh K Sharma (1.5), Himal Gusain (2) bt Mangesh Ghag Harsh (1), Vikramaditya Kulkarni (2) bt Arjun Adappa (1)

IIFL Wealth Mumbai Junior Results (Round 1) Kriish Mehta lost to Mohammad Fahad Rahman (Ban), Sadhwani Raunak bt Saumya Srivastava, Gurav Sanmil lost to Sanklap Gupta, Gukesh D bt Ekaa Desai, Rebecca Jesumarian lost to Shelke Sanarsha, Aditya Mittal bt Aryan Khurana, Sharma Vinayak Adane lost to Alok Sinha, Shuban Saha bt Aarav Lakhani, Krishnan Ritvik lost to Mendonca Leon Luke, Om Kharola bt Krish Srivastava, Dev Shah bt Kush Bhagat