Nihal Sarin and Divya Deshmukh made it a double for India at the World under-10 chess championship in Durban on Monday.
Nihal won the boys’ title with nine points from 11 rounds despite losing his last match to Dmitry Soi of Russia. He came first as his closest rival, Nodirbek Abdusattorov of Uzebkistan, was held by India’s Mohan Kushagra.
Divya won the girls’ crown on tie-breaker after she finished tied on 10 points with Bibissara Assaubayeva of Kazakhstan.
Vaibhav Suri won the silver in the under-18 section with nine points, half-a-point behind champion Olexandr Bortnyk of Ukraine. Aravind Chithambaram won the silver in the under-16 event with 8.5 points, half-a-point behind the winner Alan Pichot of Argentina.
M. Mahalakshmi was unlucky to miss out a medal in the girls’ event as she finished fourth with eight points, the same as bronze medallist Veronika Gazikova of Slovakia, who had a superior tie-break score, by half-a-point.
Bronze for VaishaliR. Vaishali won the girls’ under-14 bronze with eight points, half-a-point less than Zhou Qiyu of Canada and Oliwia Kiolbasa of Poland, who finished first and second respectively.
Luke Mendonca took the under-8 bronze with eight points, behind Ilya Makoveev of Russia and Yesuntumur Tugstumur of Mangolia, who finished in that order with 9.5 points each.
