Thipsay leads in Women's Chess Nationals

LUCKNOW: Asian under-12 champion Dronavalli Harika stunned WIM Swati Ghate, taking advantage of a mistake by her rival in the time pressure. The Andhra Pradesh girl now shares the third spot in the Women’s National A chess championship with Swati and double WGM norm holder Aarthie Ramaswamy on Thursday.
In a match between two five-time titlists, Bhagyashree Thipsay further shattered the confidence of a struggling Anupama Gokhale to take the sole lead with five points.Close on her heels was defending champion S Vijayalakshmi of Indian Airlines at 4.5 points. Her younger sister, Meenakshi has 3.5 points.
If Viji and Meenakshi surprised the crowd with the shortest draw in the championship — in only nine moves, Harika displayed good opportunism against Swati in their fourth meeting. The WIM from LIC was aggressive in the semi-Slav defence and got the ‘c’ file pawn of Harika isolated. But Swati took 22 more moves before she captured the pawn at c3 to got up by two pawns to one on queenside and increased her advantage with good kingside play. On the 53rd move, Swati overlooked a knight move that resulted in getting her king and rook forked and was forced to go for the exchange but resigned soon after.
Tania Sachdev seemed tired and preferred to share point with Dolan Champa Bose in 17 moves of the irregular opening. So did Saheli Dhar Barua and WIM Aarthie Ramaswamy in 24 moves of Sicilian defence.
Thursday’s results: S Vijayalakshmi (IA) drew with S Meenakshi (IA), D Harika (AP) bt Swati Ghate (LIC), Bhagyashree Thipsay (IDBI) bt Anupama Gokhale (BPCL), Saheli Dhar Barua (Rlys) drew with R Aarthie, Dolan Champa Bose (Jharkhand) drew with Tania Sachdev (Delhi), Eesha Karvade (Maha) bt Safira Shanaz (TN), Sai Meera Ravi (Indian Bank) - bye.
Points position: 1. B Thipsay 5/7; S Vijayalakshmi 4.5/6; R Aarthie, D Hariak — both 4/6; S Ghate 4/7; S Meenakshi 3.5/7; T Sachdev, Sai Meera, E Karvade — all 3/6; Saheli Dhar Barua 3/7; S Shanaz 2/7; A Gokhale 1.5/6; Dolan Champa Bose 1.5/7.