The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Barua is the champion

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Barua is the champion

Staff Correspondent

— Photo: R. Eswarraj

Dibyendu Barua.

MANGALORE: Grandmaster Dibyendu Barua of West Bengal won the second Mangalore FIDE rated chess tournament 2008, which concluded here on Saturday.

The former National champion, who by his own admission had a bad tournament, won a cash prize of Rs. 50,000 and a trophy after scoring nine points from 11 rounds. Defending champion and fellow GM Pravin M. Thipsay finished fifth.

Though Barua, C. Praveen Kumar and International Master G.B. Prakash (both Tamil Nadu) were tied with same points, Barua had a superior tie break. Praveen and Prakash were placed second and third respectively.

Barua who drew with Thipsay (8.5) in the final round was declared winner only after Prakash outclassed overnight joint leader B.T. Murali Krishna (8.5) of Tamil Nadu on the second board in a tense battle.

The Chairman of Karnataka Bank Ltd. Ananthakrishna gave away the trophy to Barua.

Barua, who is playing an open tournament after more than 15 years, told The Hindu that he has avoided such tournaments for fear of losing his rating.

The ever-growing strengths of lesser rated player have added to the quality of the tournament, he said and lauded the organisers for arranging a tournament of this stature. Barua said he would come to the city as observer for the National U-15 tournament.

The results: Final round: Barua 9 drew with Thipsay 8.5, Murali Krishna 8.5 lost to G.B. Prakash 9, C. Praveen Kumar 9 bt E.P. Nirmal 8, Himashu Sharma 7.5 lost to Prasad P. Praveen 8.5, Sagar Shah 8 drew with Dinesh K. Sharma 8, G.A. Stany 8 drew with Ravi Gopal Hegde 8, Amrutha Mokal 7.5 lost to Balasubramaniam Ramnathan 8.5, Aniruddha Deshpande 8 bt N. Sanjay 7, B.S. Shivananda 8 bt Santu Mondal 7.

T. Purushothaman 7 lost to Malleswara J. Rao 8, Sohan Phadke 7.5 drew with Rangarajan Linda 7.5, Varugeese Koshy 7 lost to Anurag Mhamal 8, Nassir Wajih 8 bt Arjun Sarja 7, Sekhar Chandra Sahu 8 bt Y. V. K. Chakravarthi 7, and Sriram Sarja 7.5 drew with Vikram Saralaya 7.5.

Other prizes: Youngest player: Adapa Pranjal 2.5 (Kar); U-7: Boys: S. Vasishta 4 (Kar), Girls: Viola Lewis 4 (Kar); U-9: Boys: Jeet Jain 6.5 (Guj), Girls: M. Tulsi 4 (Kar).

U-11: Boys: Vaibhav S. Bhat 6.5 (Mah), Girls: Andria L. D’ Souza 6 (Kar); U-13: Boys: M. Surya Narayana 7 (AP), Girls: Vanessa D’ Souza 6.5 (Kar). U-15: Boys: Himal Gusain 7 (Chan), Girls: K. Raksha 4.5 (Kar); promising talent (DK): P. Gopalakrishna 7.5.

Promising talent (Karnataka): M. Suraj 7.5; unrated players: Madhusoodana Bhat S. 7 (Kar); woman player: N. Madhuri 4.5 (Kar), and Veteran: Prabhakar P. Insulkar 6.5 (Goa). Special Prize: Badavath Prabhakar 4 (AP).