Mumbai, December 8: Overnight leader Madan Bagayatkar of Maharashtra continued to lead with six points at the end of the sixth round, gaining full point by virtue of Pandyarajan of Tamil Nadu not turning up for the tournament and leaving only 13 players in the fray of the Global Telesystems National ‘A’ chess championship for the blind here on Friday.Bagayatkar’s teammate Swapnil Shah (5.5 points) was in the second place while Mahipal Singh of Haryana is in the third position with four points to his credit.Swapnil Shah was playing with white pieces against N Siddaiah of Andhra Pradesh. The ‘French Defence Exchange Variation’ game saw a positional battle with Swapnil gaining the upper hand after the middle game. In the ensuing end game, Swapnil had an active bishop against Siddaiah’s knight. Siddaiah had to forfeit his knight with Swapnil’s ‘c’ pawn threatening to Queen. From then on it was only a matter of time before Swapnil emerged with a full point. In a French Defence game, Mahipal singh of Haryana handled the black side very effectively against Suryakant Raut of Maharashtra. Mahipal built a strong attack on the queen side, forcing Suryakant to lose a piece in the middle game.The advantage was converted into a victory in 43 moves by the player from Haryana. Rajesh Rajput of Gujarat played with white pieces against Vasant Patil of Maharashtra in a ‘Centre Gambit’ game. Rajput made a very premature attack leading to the loss of a pawn in the middle game.In an end game with opposite bishops, Patil defended resolutely and left Rajput with no option but to agree for a draw. Sanjay Karandikar of Maharashtra notched up his second consecutive victory, when he beat defending champion and top seed Vilesh Bhatt also of Maharashtra. Results (Round VI): Madan Bagayatkar (Mah-6 points) got a bye, Mahipal Singh (Har-4) bt Suryakant Raut (Mah-2.5), Charudatta Jadhav (Mah-2) drew P Balaraman (Ker-3.5), Gaurav Gadodia (Mah-2.5) bt Shirish Patil (Mah-2), Sanjay Karandikar (Mah-2) bt Vilesh Bhat (Mah-3), Vasant Patil (Mah-3.5) drew Rajesh Rajput (Guj-3), Swapnil Shah (Mah-5.5) bt N Siddaiah (AP-2).
