Abhijeet Gupta extends lead at National Premier Chess Championship

Abhijeet Gupta of Petroleum Sports Promotion Board (PSPB) increased his lead margin to one point in the 49th National Premier Chess Championship.

In the 10th round, he defeated P Shyam Nikhil of Tamil Nadu to garner eight points. Abhijeet is followed by Tamil Nadu GMs Deepan Chakravarthy and SP Sethuraman and GN Gopal of Kerala with seven points each.

In a miniature game of Slav defence, Shyam played the first ten moves correctly. Former champion B Adhiban of PSPB destroyed the king side pawn structure of GM Sriram Jha of LIC in the Samisch variation of Kings Indian game. Sundarrajan Kidambi of PSPB did not exert much to win in a rook and pawns ending against Railway’s IM Satarshi Roy, with two extra pawns to his credit.

G Akash of TN held 2010 champion Parimarjan Negi of PSPB in 42 moves of a Sicilian defence.

In the clash between two youngsters, WGM Padmini Rout of Orissa suffered her second straight loss at the hands of Vidit Santosh GUjrati of Maharashtra.

Mumbai players, former champion Pravin Thipsay and Aditya Udeshi, drew their game in 33 moves in a Scandinavian defence.
In another tussle between two Maharashtra players representing Railways, Shasikant Kutwal overcame Vikramaditya Kulkarni in 72 moves.

Results: (Rd-10) Abhijeet Gupta (PSPB, 8) bt Shyam Nikil P (TN, 6.5); Arun Prasad S (PSPB, 6.5) drew with Gopal GN (PSPB, 7); Deepan Chakkravarthy J (TN, 7) drew with Abhijit Kunte (PSPB, 6.5); Sethuraman SP (TN, 7) bt Tejas Bakre (IA, 6); G Akash (TN, 6) drew with Parimarjan Negi (PSPB, 6); Ashwin Jayaram (TN, 6) drew with Shyam Sundar M (TN, 6)