Sharma, Unadkat win crowns

 

 

FM AYUSH Sharma of Madhya Pradesh, with clean record of nine wins from nine rounds, won the GH Raisoni Chess Rapid FIDE Rating Chess Tournament that concluded at GH Raisoni Institute of Information and Technology, Shraddha Park, Wadi Hingna Link Road, Nagpur on Sunday. Local lad CM Vaibhav Jayant Raut and IM Vikramaditya Kulkarni of Mumbai scored eight points each and were adjudged second and third respectively based on their tie-break scores. The GH Raisoni Memorial Blitz Rating Chess Tournament was also held on Sunday. Kartavya Unadkat of Gujarat, Daksh Goyal from Delhi, FM Sharma from Madhya Pradesh and Aditya Bartakke of Maharashtra all scored eight points out of nine rounds.

 

However, after application of tie-break rule, Unadkat was declared winner. Daksh, Ayush and Aditya Bartakke were placed second, third and fourth respectively. The chess festival was organised by GH Raisoni Sport and Cultural Foundation jointly with Kalpana Prakash Welfare Foundation and was recognised by Chess Association Nagpur, Maharashtra Chess Association, AICF and FIDE. The chess festival attracted huge response this year with 266 participants in Classic, 404 in Rapid event and 334 in Blitz FIDE Rating Tournament. Prizes of Rapid and Blitz FIDE Rating events were distributed at the hands of Hariom Gupta, Assistant Director (OL), Central GST, Nagpur and Adv Chetan Rajkarne, Vice-President, Chess Association Nagpur.

 

Prizes were given to top twenty players in rapid rating besides prizes for best rating 1601 to 1301, rating 1300 to 1000, best unrated, best veteran, best Nagpur, best female and trophies for top 5 Under-7, 9, 11, 13, 15 players. The winner of blitz event was awarded a digital chess clock. Trophies were awarded to top six winners on merit. Besides this, trophies were also given to top finishers of Under-11, 15, best veteran, best female. IA Ajinkya Pingle was Chief Arbiter for the event who was being assisted by Deputy Arbiter Shiva Iyer, Amit Tembhurne, Swati Kumbhalkar, Shubham Soni, Shyam Agrawal, Prayas Ambade, Sagar Sakhare, Jeet Thakre, Nilesh Channawar, Manthan Shende, Sheetal Panbude, Gayatri Panbude, Shrikant Bagde, Sonal Tambi, Bharti Dhote, Prathamesh Machave and Shishir Indurkar.