Manish and Kheerti take honours
In a dramatic finish, Odisha’s Manish Kumar topped a three-way tie to win the National under-18 online rapid chess title on Saturday.
Off the lead by half-a-point after the penultimate round, Manish, Aronyak Ghosh (Bengal) and Ayush Sharma (Madhya Pradesh) won the final rounds to tie at nine points from 11 rounds.
In the final round, Manish and Ayush accounted for the two 10th round leaders — M. Pranesh (Tamil Nadu) and Sankalp Gupta (Maharashtra) — while Aronyak defeated Raja Rithvik (Telangana).
The girls’ title went to Telangana’s G. Kheerthi who scored nine points from 11 rounds. Uttar Pradesh’s Riya Mishra and Tamil Nadu’s V. Rindhiya tied for the second spot with 8.5 points.
Meanwhile, in a major development, a five-member Fairplay Committee comprising Grandmasters Tejas Bakre, M.R. Lalith Babu, N. Srinath and International Masters Rakesh Kulkarnni and Akshat Khamparia found two girls guilty of resorting to unfair means during the matches. Based on video evidence, these girls were asked to leave the competition early on Saturday.
Zero-tolerance
“We have a zero-tolerance approach to cheating,” maintained the All India Chess Federation secretary Bharat Singh Chauhan.
