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Prakash shines the brightest

Special Correspondent

Marat Dzhumaev leads with maximum points

Bitan Banerjee stuns IM Shojaat Ghane
Anurag Mhamal on course for a possible International Master-norm

NEW DELHI: G.B. Prakash has chosen a fine stage to serve a reminder that he is still around.

After accounting for two overseas seeds from the top-10 list, the Indian Bank player got his calculations right against the eighth seeded Uzbek Saidali Iuldachev for a sixth-round draw in the Parsvnath International Open chess tournament at the Modern School here on Wednesday.

Seven years after claiming his third and final GM norm, Prakash is still way behind the stipulated rating of 2500.

His current rating of 2341 is a fair reflection of his playing strength but not his form.

On Tuesday, Prakash defeated sixth seed Ukraine’s Yuri Solodvnichenko and 10th seed Bangaldesh’s GM in-waiting Enamul Hossain to share the lead.

In second spot

Prakash, better known as Commonwealth champion R.B. Ramesh’s elder brother, battled for 86 moves against former champion Iuldachev on Wednesday and shared the second spot. On the top board, Uzbek Marat Dzhumaev, seeded three, surprised seventh seeded Russian Igor Kurnosov with black pieces to emerge as the only player with a perfect score.

While most of the results came on expected lines, lowly rated Kolkata-lad Bitan Banerjee stunned Iranian International Master Shojaat Ghane with black pieces to reach five points.

Mhamal impresses

Thirteen-year-old Anurag Mhamal, too, stayed on course of a possible IM-norm when he drew with Roktim Bandyopadhyay. In the previous rounds, Mhamal had drawn with IMs Saptarshi Roy and former National champion P. Konguvel.

The results: Sixth round (Indians unless stated): Igor Kurnosov (Rus, 5) lost to Marat Dhzumaev (Uzb, 6); G. B. Prakash (5.5) drew with Saidali Iuldachev (Uzb, 5); Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (Iri, 5.5) bt Sapar Batyrov (Tkm, 4.5); R. R. Laxman (4.5) lost to Surya Shekhar Ganguly (5.5); Elizbar Ubilava (Esp, 5.5) bt Shukhrat Safin (Uzb, 4.5). Nguyen Ahn Dung (Vie, 5) drew with K. Ratnakaran (5); Morteza Mahjoob (Iri, 5) drew with S. Arun Prasad (5); Abhijit Kunte (5) bt Arjun Tiwari (4.5). Aditya Udeshi (4) lost to Enamul Hossain (Ban, 5); Atanu Lahiri (4) lost to Abhijeet Gupta (5); Akshat Khamparia (4) lost to Ziaur Rehman (Ban, 5). Aswin Jayaram (5) bt C. J. Arvind (4); Pravin Thipsay (5) bt M. R. Lalith Babu (4).

K. Priyadarshan (4.5) drew with M. R. Venkatesh (4.5); Shojaat Ghane (Iri, 4) lost to Debashis Das (5); C. Praveen Kumar (4.5) drew with S. Kidambi (4.5). Tania Sachdev (5) bt Soumyaranjan Mishra (4); Bitan Banerjee (5) bt Morteza Darban (Iri, 4); Kantilal Dave (4.5) drew with P. Konguvel (4.5).

Vikramaditya Kamble (4) lost to V. A. V. Rajesh (5). Anurag Mhamal (4.5) drew with Roktim Bandyopadhyay (4.5); Zhanibek Amanov (Kaz, 5) bt Krishna Thapa (Nep, 4); N. Sudhakar Babu (4.5) drew with Rakesh Kulkarni (4.5); G. B. Joshi (3.5) lost to Yuri Solodovnichenko (Ukr, 4.5); Sriram Jha (4.5) bt Sahaj Grover (3.5).

Fifth round: Safin drew with Maghami; Rahman lost to Kurnosov; Arun Prasad drew with Ubilava; Morteza lost to Marat; Hossain lost to Prakash; Tiwari drew with Mahjoob.

Ganguly bt Saravanan; Kunte drew with Amanov; Iuldachev bt Swati Ghate; Akshayraj Kore lost to Nguyen Anh Dung; Bandyopadhyay drew with Aswin.

Batyrov bt Akash Thakur; Venkatesh drew with Khamparia; Karthikeyan lost to Laxman; Ratnakaran bt Sahaj Grover.

Fourth round: Maghami bt M.S. Thejkumar; Kurnosov bt Vishnu Prasanna; Saravanan drew with Kunte; Ubilava bt Taibur Rahman; Prakash bt Solodovnichenko.

Marat bt Shashikant Kutwal; Sudhakar Babu lost to Enamul Hossain; Mahjoob Morteza bt Atanu Lahiri; Safin bt Nassir Wajih; D.P. Singh lost to Ziaur Rahman.

Arjun Tiwari bt S. Kidambi; Ram Prakash lost to Arun Prasad; Morteza Darban bt Mehar Chinna Reddy; N. Srinath lost to Ganguly; Swapnil Dhopade lost to Iuldachev.

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