Piya Saxena shocked Maharashtra teammate and top seed Bhagyashree Patil in the girls’ second round of the National under-7 chess championship at Puducherry on Monday. Piya, playing black, won in 55 moves to be among the leaders with two points.
On the top board in the open section, top seed Praggnanandhaa of Chennai prevailed with the black pieces against Pawan using the Ruy Lopez.
In the morning session, girls’ second seed Gunjal Chopdekar of Goa was shocked by Main Doshi of Gujarat and boys’ second seed Siddhanth Lohia lost to Maharashtra Statemate and unrated Sudhanshu Nikam.
The top three finishers will represent India in the under-8 section of the Asian youth championship and world youth championship in 2013.
As many as 70 girls and 139 boys are in fray in the championship, which was inaugurated by T. Thiagarajan, minister for electricity & sports, Puducherry, on Sunday.
Nine rounds remain to be played.
Important results (second round): Boys: Pawan Mohit (AP) 1 lost to R. Praggnanandhaa (TN) 2; S. Pranav (AP) 2 bt B. Sriram (TN) 1; Leon Mendonca (Goa) 2 bt Arya More (Mah) 1; Pratyay Chowdhury (WB) 2 bt Aayush Barot (Guj) 1; Abhay Gopal (Guj) 1 lost to Sudhanshu Nikam (Mah) 2; A.R. Abhishek (Ker) 1 lost to Priyansu Patra (Ori) 2.
Girls: Bhagyashree Patil (Mah) 1 lost to Piya Saxena (Mah) 2; Natura Bethi (AP) 2 bt Prakakta Naik (Goa) 1; Aditi Mohanty (Ori) 2 bt Ridu Varshini (TN) 1; Ahalya (TN) 2 bt Riya Marathe (Mah) 1; Panda Miracle (Ori) 1 lost to Ananya (Kar) 2; B. Aswatha (TN) 1 lost to Samal Swagatika (Ori) 2.
