RAMCO U-13 Chess: Winning start by Aravindh

Chennai - Top seed and FIDE Master V.R. Aravindh Chithambaram was off to a winning start in defending his title in the first round of the RAMCO 26th National Under-13 Open and Girls Chess Championship here Saturday.

Chithambaram converted his middle game advantage to a full point against Eshan Balachandar of Maharashtra. Sharing the lead with Aravindh were other seeds Abhimanyu Puranik (Mah), Pranav Vijay and N.R. Visakh (both TN).

In the girls section, National Under-11 champion R Vaishali of Tamil Nadu scored a comfortable victory over her state mate V. Aarthi. Also finishing on the winning side were seeds Savant Riya, Rutuja Bakshi and C.H. Meghna.

Round 1 Results:

Boys: Aravindh Chithambaram V R (TN) bt Balachandar Eshan (Mah), Hari Madhavan N B (TN) lost to Puranik Abhimanyu (Mah), Pranav Vijay (TN) btShrutarshi Ray (WB), Yutesh P (TN) lost to Visakh N R (TN), Pranavananda V (AP) bt Karthik JC (AP), Navnitan S V (TN) lost to Harsha Bharathakoti (AP), Ritviz Parab (Goa) bt Khanda Soumya Sagnik (Ori), Pitkar Ashutosh (Mah) lost to Karthik V (AP), Kaustuv Kundu (WB) bt Bathula Abhinav Reddy (TN), Narendran V (TN) drew Sai Vishwesh.C (TN).

Girls: Vaishali R (TN) bt Aarthi V (TN), Niveditha K (TN) lost to Savant Riya (Goa), Bakshi Rutuja (Mah) bt Tejasvi M (TN), Nabanita Pattanayak (Ori) lost to Meghna C H (Ker), Shiny Das (Tripura) bt Kharunya C.S (TN), Swathi Y (AP) lost to Tejaswini Sagar (Mah), Manjula R (TN) bt Shah Rutvi (Guj), Priyamvadha Sundar (TN) lost to Ananya S (Kar), Anigani Kavya (AP) drew Anmol Jain (AP), Kaur Palkin (Del) drew Potluri Saye Srreezza (AP).