Sunyasakta, Akankhya shine at u-11 chess Natls

Girls stole the show for Orissa in the seventh round of the 23rd National Under-11 Chess Championship with two of them occupying top two places at Shivamogga (Karnataka) today. Top seed Sunyasakta Satpathy (6 points) beat overnight sole leader GK Monnisha (TN) to join second seed Ivana Maria Furtado (Goa) and M Mahalakshmi (TN) in the lead. Lower ranked Akankhya Kabi (5.5) continued her impressive run, registering another solid win, her fifth overall, to advance from 28th to sixth position. She now shares the second place with two others. Orissa boys, however, experienced a disappointing day as two leading players — Rakesh Jena, Soumen Amlan — suffered defeats. Second seed Sidhant Mohapatra slipped to joint third position as he was forced to a draw. Orissa results (Round 7): Girls: Sunyasakta Satpathy (6) bt Gk Monnisha (TN), Akankhya Kabi (5.5) bt Dhanashree Pandit (Mah), Adyasha Pattnaik (4) lost to U Ashwini (TN), Smaraki Mohanty (4) lost to Rutuja Bakshi (Mah), Sribrinda Rout (4) bt Nishi Mahalaxmi Iyer (WB), Pooja Snapati (3.5) lost to R Vaishali (TN), Subhashree Priyadarshini (1.5) lost to M Tusli (Kar). Boys: Sidhant Mohapatra (5.5) drew with RV Adith (TN), Rakesh Kumar Jena (5) lost to Shaikh Nubairshah (Mah), Chinmay Routray (4.5) bt Soura Sekhar Banerjee (WB), Soumen Amlan (4) lost to Naren P Swaminathan (TN), Bhaskar Sri Viswaroopanand (4) lost to Rohan Ahuja (Goa), Mohit Sahoo (3) bt Ayush Pandey (UP).