Sasikiran and Pallavi in lead

By Arvind Aaron

COLOMBO, MAY 6. Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran from Chennai and Pallavi Shah from Kolhapur are leading the men's and women's sections after scoring three successive victories in the FIDE World chess zonal championship being played here at the Airport Garden Hotel on Sunday.

While top seed Sasikiran sliced the best of Bangladesh for his two victories, Pallavi Shah bettered her more famous Indian rivals, Swati Ghate and Meenakshi Subbaraman to snatch sole lead. Sasikiran is leading by a half point while Pallavi is leading by a full point. The men's tournament is a 12-player round-robin while the women's is a 10-player round-robin tournament.

In men GMs Dibyendu Barua, Abhijit Kunte and Surya Sekhar Ganguly are in joint second spot with 2.5 points. In women the Subbaraman sisters, Meenakshi and Vijayalakshmi, are on two points along with Swati Ghate and Tanima Parveen of Bangladesh.

The winner in both sections will qualify to the World championship knockout to be held later this year. World champion Viswanathan Anand will also represent the zone but as a seeded player and title holder.

Second round

Earlier, in the second round this morning, Saheli Barua bounced back from Saturday's loss to Meenakshi to defeat top seed Vijayalakshmi for the tournament's biggest upset.

Facing a Pirc defence, Saheli opted for the quiet variation as white. Vijayalakshmi's aggressive pawn advances on the queen side was retaliated by a central punch by white. Black who had not anticipated this, lost a rook for bishop on move 21 and white's aggression led to a mating attack on move 35 when Vijayalakshmi resigned.

Chennai college student Meenakshi who is on scholarship from Indian Airlines was lucky to defeat veteran Rani Hamid of Bangladesh when the latter blundered on move 31 to lose a rook for minor piece. Rani Hamid was dominating the Nimzo- Indian defence encounter when she fell for a pawn bait and paid with her full point to lose in 43 moves.

Pallavi Shah who is playing her first tournament since the poor showing in the Istanbul Olympiad won against roommate Swati Ghate and covered the losses to her in the last two years with a 42- move victory with black. Pallavi had white in trouble from move 18 when Swati had to resort to defend her pawn with a rook. Ultimately, Swati sacrificed this rook when black's dominance grew but it was too late to seek compensation. Pallavi who played the Sicilian Najdorf as black was about to mate white when the resignation came.

The three GMs, Sasikiran from Chennai, Kunte from Pune and Barua from Kolkatta scored two victories and were leading with two full points.

Kunte recorded the easiest second round victory beating Amarawickrama in just 20 moves with white in a Pirc defence game. Kunte attacked the knight which was supporting a bishop and won a piece that forced the Sri Lankan player to surrender.

Sasikiran downed the best non-Indian challenger Reefat Bin-Sattar in 33 moves with black after the Bangladesh player lost a pawn and sacrificed a piece without compensation. Unwilling to challenge Sasikiran's opening knowledge, Reefat opted for a 2.b3 against the Sicilian defence and surrendered the opening advantage which normally white is known to enjoy.

Barua had to work a lot for a win over veteran T.D.R. Peiris. In a two knights opening, Barua's king side attack as white translated into an advantageous queen and pawn ending which he converted using the two extra pawns.

Prasad played very positionally but could not convert his big advantage into a victory with black from an irregular closed Sicilian defence game. Hossain played resourcefully at the fag end by sacrificing a bishop and rook to draw by repetition of moves in 50 moves.

Surya Sekhar Ganguly drew Rahman in 17 moves with the black pieces and did not try to use his experience and big near 300- point Elo difference.

Monday is the only free day. Eight rounds remain to be played for men and six rounds for women. Both events have a prize fund of $2,500 together.

lThe results: third round: Men: K. Sasikiran bt E. Hossain, H.U. Amarawickrama lost to Abu Sufain Shakil, T.D.R. Peiris drew with A. Kunte, D.V. Prasad drew with D. Barua, S.S. Ganguly bt Reefat Bin Sattar, L. Wijesuriya lost to T. Rahman.

Women: Pallavi Shah bt S. Meenakshi, S. Vijayalakshmi bt Vineetha Wijesuriya, Anupama Konara lost to Tanima Parveen, Upasena Hasini lost to Swati Ghate, Saheli Barua

lost to Rani Hamid.

Second round: Men: D. Barua bt T.D.R. Peiris, Enamul Hossain drew with D.V. Prasad, A. Kunte bt H.U. Amarawickrama, Reefat Bin- Sattar lost to K. Sasikiran, Tairbur Rahman drew with S.S. Ganguly, Abu Sufain Shakil bt L. Wijesuriya.

Women: Tanima Parveen bt Upasena Hasini, Vineetha Wijesuriya drew with Anupa Konara, Saheli Barua bt S. Vijayalakshmi, Swati Ghate lost to Pallavi Shah, S. Meenakshi bt Rani Hamid.

The standings after three rounds: Men: 1 K. Sasikiran (Ind) 3/3; 2-4 D. Barua, A. Kunte, S. Ganguly (all Ind) 2.5 each; 5 Abu Sufain Shakil (Ban) 2; 6-7 Taibur Rahman, Enamul Hossain (both Ban) 1.5 each; 8-9 D.V. Prasad (Ind), Reefat Bin-Sattar (Ban) 1 each; 10 T.D.R. Peiris (Srl) 0.5; 11-12 H.U. Amarawickrama, L. Wijesuriya (Srl) 0 each.

Women: 1 Pallavi Shah (Ind) 3/3; 2-5 S. Meenakshi, S. Vijayalakshmi, Swati Ghate (all Ind), Tanima Parveen (Ban) 2 each; 6 V. Wijesuriya (Srl) 1.5; 7-8 Rani Hamid (Ban), Saheli Barua (Ind) 1 each; 9 Anupama Korana (Srl) 0.5; 10 Upasena Hasini (Srl) 0.

lThe moves: Saheli Barua-WGM S. Vijayalakshmi, round three, Pirc defence, B08: 1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.Be2 0-0 6.0-0 c6 7.a4 a5 8.h3 Na6 9.Bxa6 Rxa6 10.Qe2 Qc7 11.Be3 Rd8 12.Rad1 Ra8 13.Rfe1 b6 14.Qc4 Ba6 15.Qb3 b5 16.axb5 cxb5 17.e5 Ne8 18.Nd5 Qb7 19.Bg5 Bf8 20.exd6 e6 21.Bxd8 Rxd8 22.Ne3 Nxd6 23.Ng4 a4 24.Qe3 Nc4 25. Qg5 Be7 26.Nh6+ Kg7 27.Nf5+ exf5 28.Rxe7 Rd7 29.Rde1 h6 30.Rxd7 Qxd7 31.Qf4 Nxb2 32.Qe5+ Kh7 33.Qf6 Bb7 34.Re7 Qd5 35.Rxf7+ 1-0.

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