New Delhi: Overnight sole leader Karthikeyan Murali maintained his sole lead  with six and half points after signing the peace treaty with second seed Sidhant Mohapatra of Orissa in the seventh round of the ongoing 25thNational Under-13 Open Chess Championship at Kulachi Hansraj Model School on Thursday.

Playing safe in Kan variation of Sicilian Defence, Murali and Mohapatra agreed to split the point after just 17 moves. Tamilnadu players Visakh N R, Pranav Vijay, Harsha Bharathakoti of Andhrapradesh and Debankan Dhara of West Bengal are giving company to Mohapatra in the joint second spot with a drift of half point from the leader.

In the seventh round encounters, Viaskh beat Nikhil Dixit of Maharahstra while Bharathkoti shocked third seed Mohammad Nubairshah Shaikh.  Pranav Vijay and Debankan Dhara got better off Krishna Teja of Andhrapradesh and Vignesh N R of Tamilnadu respectively.  Top seed Arvindh Chithambaram suffered another setback to his title hopes as he satisfied with half point against Abhimanyu Puranik of Maharashtra in the seventh round.

Meanwhile in the girls’ category, top seed Ivana Maria Furtado of Goa and defending champion Monnisha G K of Tamilnadu sharing the pole position with six points.  Playing white side of Volga Gambit game, World Under-12 silver medalist Ivana defeated         U Ashwini of Tamilnadu without much struggle in 33 moves while Monnisha overcame her state mate Vaishali R in 77 moves arrived out of Hungarian defence.

Six players including World Under-12 bronze medalist M Mahalakshmi of Tamilnadu, who beat overnight joint leader Shoumi Mukjerjee of West Bengal are in joint second spot with five and half points.

Important Results :

Round-7 Open : Sidhant Mohapatra of Orissa (6) drew with Kathikeyan Murali of Tamilnadu (6.5); Arvindh Chithambaram V R of Tamilnadu (5.5) drew with Abhimanyu Puranik of Maharashtra (5.5); Mohammad Nubairshah Shaik of Maharahstra (5) lost to Harsha Bharathakoti of Andhrapradesh (6); Visakh N R of Tamilnadu (6) beat Nikhil Dixit of Maharashtra (5); Krishna Teja N of Andhrapradesh (5) lost to Pranav Vijay of Tamilnadu (6); Debankan Dhara of West Bengal (6) beat Vignesh N R of Tamilnadu (5); Raghav Srivathsav of Andhrapradesh (5.5) drew with Harshal Shahi of Delhi (5.5); Rohan Ahuja of Goa (5.5) beat Hetul Shah of Gujarat (4.5); Akshay Bharadwaj of Karnataka (4.5) lost to Pranavananda V of Andhrapradesh (5.5); Kaustuv Kundu of West Bengal (5) drew with Pavit Singh of Delhi (5); Grahesh Y of Andhrapradesh (5.5) beat Kumaran B of Tamilnadu (4.5); Naren Swaminathan P of Tamilnadu (5.5) beat Anatharam R U of Karnataka (4.5); Ritviz Parab of Goa (5) drew with Nishant Kumar of Jharkhand (5); Sai Vishwesh of Tamilnadu (5) beat Kushagra Sharma of Rajasthan (4); Athul Krishna S of Kerala (4.5) drew with Saptorshi Gupta of West Bengal (4.5).


Round-7 Girls :  Ivana Maria Furtado (6) beat Ashwini U of Tamilnadu (5); Vaishali R of Tamilnadu (5) lost to Monnisha G K of Tamilnadu (6); Mahalakshmi M of Tamilnadu (5.5) beat Shoumi Mukerjee of West Bengal (5); Sunyasakta Satpathy of Orissa (4.5) lost to Shiny Das of Tripura (5.5); Rutuja Bakshi of Maharashtra (5.5) beat Meghna C H of Kerala (4.5); Hilmi Parveen of Kerala (5.5) beat Varshini V of Tamilnadu (4.5); Anigani Kavya of Andhrapradesh (5.5) beat Divya Lakshmi R of Tamilnadu (4.5); Smaraki Mohanty of Orissa (4) lost to Divya Garg of Maharashtra (5); Megha Gupta of Gujarat (5) beat Kesshni Bhasiin of Delhi (4); Dharani Sree R of Tamilnadu (5) beat Kratica Shekhwat of Rajasthan (4); Gange Tanmayee of Maharashtra (5) beat Dhanshree Pandit of Maharashtra (4); Chitlange Sakshi of Maharashtra (4) lost to Manjula R of Tamilnadu (5); Deekshidha P S of Tamilnadu (5) beat Manasa H R of Karnataka (4); Vishwa Shah of Maharahstra (3.5) lost to Priyamvadha Karamcheti of Andhrapradesh (4.5); Akankhya Kabi of Orissa (4.5) beat Shweta Priyadharshini of Uttarpradesh (3.5).

Important Games :

Sidhant Mohapatra (2189) v/s Karthikeyan Murali (2124)

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6 5.Nc3 Qc7 6.Bd3 Nf6 7.f4 Bb4 8.Bd2 d6 9.Qe2 Nbd7 10.O-O-O O-O 11.Kb1 Bxc3 12.Bxc3 e5 13.Nf5 Nc5 14.fxe5 dxe5 15.Rhf1 Bxf5 16.Rxf5 Nxd3 17.Rd3 1/2-1/2

Aravindh Chithamabaram V R (2213) v/s Abhimanyu Puranik (1918)

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5 c6 7.dxc6 bxc6 8.Qf3 Qc7 9.Bd3 h6 10.Ne4 Nd5 11.Ng3 g6 12.Nc3 Nb4 13.Nge2 Nxd3 14.cxd3 Bg7 15.O-O O-O 16.b4 Nb7 17.Ba3 Rd8 18.Rac1 Qd7 19.Rb1 a6 20.Rfc1 Rb8 21.h3 Qxd3 22.Qc6 Be6 23.b5 Na5 24.Qc7 Nc4 25.Be7 Rdc8 26.Qa7 axb5 27.Bb4 h5 28.Qe7 Qxd2 29.Rd1 Qc2 30.Rbc1 Qf5 31.Ng3 1/2-1/2