GANDHINAGAR, Jun 3” Dakshita Kumawat sprang a major surprise defeating Woman Grand Master Rakshitta Ravi in the second round of World Junior girls’ chess championship here on Monday.
After Abhimanyu Mishra suffered a defeat in the first round in the open section, this was the biggest upset of the day and Rakshitta will have a long task to crawl back into the lead position, being the second-highest rated girl to take part in the event.
With nine rounds still remaining in both the sections, India’s best bet in open category, Grandmaster Pranav Anand, ensured his second win on the trot at the expense of compatriot Sanket Chakravarty.
Pranav will be elevated to the top board in the next round as the second seed Aleksey Grebnev of Russia was also held to a draw by Bodrogi Bendeguz of Hungary.
The day, however, belonged to Dakshita who stole the thunder defeating one of the key aspirants for the podium finish. It was a special effort by Dakshita who employed the King pawn opening and got entangled in a theory that is known to be fine for black.
However, in her bid to attack, Rakshitta was caught on the wrong foot as she sacrificed way too much in trying to win the game. The extra material finally had a grand say in the matter as Dakshita promoted an extra queen and romped home with plenty to spare.
As many as four Indians — Pranav Anand, Mayank Charaborty, Sambit Patra and Prraneeth Vuppala — share the top spot among 12 players in the open section while in the girls section, it’s a 19-way lead with nine Indian girls having a perfect score including top seed Divya Deshmukh and Dakhita.
Important results round 2 (Indians unless specified) Open: Grebnev Aleksey (FID, 1.5) drew with Bodrogi Bendeguz (Hun, 1.5); Sanket Chakravarty (1) lost to Pranav Anand (2); Dudin Gleb (Hun, 2) beat Tarun Kanyamarala (Irl, 1); S Aswath (1) lost to Siddharth Jagadeesh (Sgp, 2); Makarian Rudik (Fid, 1.5) drew with Ayush Sharma (1.5); Shahil Dey (1.5) drew with Subelj Jan (Slo, 1.5); Manish Anto Cristiano (1) lost to Nogerbek Kazybek (Kaz, 2); Adireddy Arjun (1) lost to Cardoso Jose Gabriel (Col, 2); Aditya Samant (1.5) drew with S Harshad (1.5); Avinash Ramesh (1.5) drew with Daniel Quizon (Phi, 1.5); A R Ilamparthi (1.5) drew with Mukund Hemant Agarwal (1.5); Vrashank Chouhan (1,5) drew with Pham Tran Gia Phuc (Vie, 1.5); Prraneeth Vuppala (2) beat Md Imran (1); Mnyasta Charlton (Rsa, 1) lost to Mayank Chakraborty (2); Arsen Davtyan (Arm, 2) beat Kalyani Sirin (1); Nainys Zanas (Ltu, 2) beat L Srihari (1); Wafa Hamed (Egy, 2) beat V S Nandish (1); Harshit Pawar (1.5) drew with Anuj Shrivatri (1.5); Daksh Goyal (1.5) drew ith Domalchuk-Jonasson Aleksandr (Isl, 1.5); Apoorv Kamble (1.5) drew with Sri Charan Sandipagu 1.5); Guru Prakash (1.5) drew with Rybka Simon (Svk, 1.5).
Girls: Divya Deshmukh (2) beat Sherali Pattnaik (1); Shubhi Gupta (1) lost to Mariam Mkrtchyan (Arm, 2); Krasteva Beloslava (Bul, 1.5) drew with Bhagyashree Patil (1.5); Khairmode Dhanashree (1) lost to Liya Kurmangaliyeva (Kaz, 1); Wikar Martyna (Pol, 2) beat Ishvi Aggarwal (1); Dakshita Kumawat (2) beat Rakshitta Ravi (1); Balabayeva Xeniya (Kaz, 2) beat Arshiya Das (1); Marium Fatima (1) lost to Norman Kseniya (Fid); Ayan Allahverdiyeva (Aze, 2) beat Bristy Mukherjee (1); Abdinova Narmin (Aze, 2) beat S Kanishka (1); Akshaya Sathi (1.5) drew with Anastasia Grozdanovic (Srb, 1.5); Ewa Barwinska (Pol, 2) lost to Saparya Ghosh (2); Ashita Jain (1) lost to G Tejaswini (2); Yashvi Jain (2) beat Anishka Vikram (1); Lucia Striskova (Svk, 1) lost to Arya Mallar (2); Drishtee Ghosh (1) lost to Lala Shohradova (Tkm, 2); Asmita Avijit Ray (1) lost to V Rindhiya (2); Andhin Tehjha Nidhi (MRI, 1) lost to Sneha Halder (2). (PTI)
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