Anwesh consolidates lead, Swayams stays 2nd

Orissa’s Anwesh Upadhyaya consolidated his sole lead with victory over G A Stany in the seventh round of the 20th National Under-17 Chess Championship at Chakradharpur in Jharkhand today. Fourth seed Anwesh now leads the table with 6.5 points, which include six wins and a draw. His statemate Swayams Mishra held on to the second place desptite being forced to a draw on the second board. Biswajit Nayak, the third Orissa boy competing in the open category, posted win after two defeats to be placed 20th with four points. In girls’ category, Aparajita Gochhikar was highest placed (15th) among three Orissa players with four points in her account. She was followed with 3.5 points each by Sunyasakta Satpathy and Smaraki Mohanty at 21st and 23rd positions respectively. Orissa results (Round 7): Boys: Anwesh Upadhyaya (6.5) beat GA Stany (Kar), Swayams Mishra (5.5) drew with S Nitin (TN), Biswajeet Nayak (4) beat Rishav Mitra (WB). Girls: Aparajita Gochhikar (4) beat N Hema Priya (TN), Sunyasakta Satpathy (3.5) lost to Soukhin Pramanik (Jhar), Smaraki Mohanty (3.5) beat Chandreyee Hajra (WB). Pairings (Round 8): Boys: A Upadhyaya vs Sameer Kathmale (Mah), Swayams Mishra vs Deepak Katiyar (UP), B Nayak vs Roshan Rangarajan (Mah). Girls: A Gochhikar vs Soukhin Pramanik (Jhar), S Satpathy vs Pooja Baghel (Chhat), Smaraki Mohanty vs RK Vidyalakshmi Devi (Mani).