Kanpur (01 Mar 22) :- The MPL 58th Senior National Chess Championship at Ganges Club, Kanpur heading for an exciting finish as five players are now leading the point table with six and half points with just three rounds remaining in the thirty lakh prize money event hosted by Uttar Pradesh Chess Sports Association and sponsored by MPL Sports Foundation. Follow us on facebook and twitter.
In the crucial eighth round on Tuesday morning, Tamil Nadu Grandmaster P Iniyan outwitted top seed B Adhiban (together, above left) while International Master P Pranav (above right) shocked seasoned campaigner Grandmaster Deep Sengupta to join Erigaisi Arjun (below left) and Gukesh D (below right) in the top point table along with defending champion Aravindh Chithambaram, who beat Railwayman Sayantan Das in the eighth round encounter.
Overnight joint leaders Grandmasters Arjun Erigaisi and D Gukesh signed the peace treaty with Visakh N R and Lalith Babu M R respectively which enabled Iniyan, Pranav and Aravindh (photo below) to catch up with the leaders with contrasting wins in the eighth round.
In other important encounters, Grandmaster Mitrabha Guha and Aryan Chopra agreed to split the points while commonwealth champion Abhijeet Gupta beat Nitin S of Railways. Mitrabha, Aryan and Abhijeet are now trailing behind the leaders with a drift of half point along with Lalith Babu M R, Visakh N R, Swapnil Dhopade and Aditya Mittal. Swapnil got the better of IM Srijit Paul of West Bengal while Adiya registered victory over Srihari L R of Tamil Nadu in the eighth round battle.
Earlier, Prof Vinay Kumar Pathak, Vice Chancellor of Chhatrapati Shahu Ji Maharaj Kanpur University inaugurated the eighth round proceedings in presence of Dr Sanjay Kapoor, President All India Chess Federation.
In the ninth round, which is now in progress at the time of report, Pranav is taking on Arjun Erigaisi while Gukesh is pitted against Iniyan P and Aravindh paired against Swapnil Dhopade.