Top seed L.N. Ram Aravind moved into sole lead in the National under-11 chess championship despite being held to a draw by seventh-seeded Nihal Sarin in the seventh round at Puri, Odisha, on Monday. With four rounds remaining, Ram has 6.5 points.
Important results (seventh round): L.N. Ram Aravind 6.5 drew with Nihal Sarin 6; Koustav Chatterjee 5.5 drew with Om Kharola 5.5; Arjun Erigaisi 6 bt Sankalp Gupta 5; N.B. Hari Madhavan 5 lost to Mohan Kushagra 6; R. Raja Rithvik 4.5 lost to P. Vijay Shreeram 6; R. Pragnananda 5.5 bt Avijaan Roy Choudhury 4.5; Shuban Saha 4.5 lost to Sankarsha Shelke 5.5; M. Mohammed Anees 4.5 lost to Aronyak Ghosh 5.5; G.M. Vel Vishwanathan 4.5 lost to Aditya Basu 5.5; Vrandesh Parekh 5.5 bt V.S. Rahul 4.5.
Girls: Mehendi Sil 5 lost to C. Lakshmi 6.5; Mrudul Dehankar 6 bt Divya Deshmukh 5; Saina Salonika 5.5 bt Seeya Thakre 4.5; Bhagyashree Patil 5.5 bt Ayantika Das 4.5; D. Jishitha 4.5 lost to B. Mounika Akshaya 5.5; Bristy Mukherjee 5.5 bt Gunjal Chopdekar 4.5; Manya Bagla 4.5 lost to Arushi Kotwal 5.5; Sudipa Holdar 4.5 lost to Swera Braganca 5; Sinthia Sarkar 4 lost to Eesha Sarda 5; Shivani Madhu 3.5 lost to Ananya Gupta 4.5.