National Women’s chess c’ship: Aashna Makhija leads after fifth win

Former champion Mary Ann Gomes (4.5) moved to the second spot by beating Aashna’s state-mate from Maharashtra, Vishwa Shah.

REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE: Aashna Makhija leads the MPL National women’s chess championship after five rounds in Kolhapur. | Photo Credit: GETTY IMAGES

Maintaining her all-win record, Aashna Makhija emerged as the only leader after five rounds of the MPL National women’s chess championship when she defeated overnight co-leader Sakshi Chitlange in 57 moves at Kolhapur on Friday.

Former champion Mary Ann Gomes (4.5) moved to the second spot by beating Aashna’s state-mate from Maharashtra, Vishwa Shah.

The much-awaited clash between the defending champion Divya Deshmukh and top seed Vantika Agrawal ended as a draw in 63 moves.

Divya, Vantika, Sakshi, Srija Seshadri, Soumya Swaminathan, C. M. N. Sunyukhta, Bhakti Kulkarni, Bristy Mukherjee and V. Rindhiya (four points each) shared the third spot.

In the men’s category, Koustav Chatterjee pulled off the biggest upset by bringing down top seeded overnight leader S. P. Sethuraman in 50 moves in the ninth round.

The eighth-seeded Bengal boy now leads the field with 7.5 points, half a point ahead of Sethuraman, former champion Abhijeet Gupta and youngster L. R. Srihari.

Leading results:

Fifth round: Sakshi Chitlange (4) lost to Aashna Makhija (5); Divya Deshmukh (4) drew with Vantika Agrawal (4); Mary Ann Gomes (4.5) bt Vishwa Shah (3.5); Kiran Manisha Mohanty (3) lost to Soumya Swaminathan (4); P. S. Srreezaa (3) lost to Bhakti Kulkarni (4); Arpita Mukherjee (3.5) drew with P. Supreetha (3.5); C. Lakshmi (3) lost to Srija Seshadri (4); Dakshita Kumawat (3.5) drew with Srishti Pandey (3.5); Bristy Mukherjee (4) bt V. Varshini (3); B. Mounika Akshaya (3) lost to V. Rindhiya (4).