MUMBAI, NOV 24: Five players have maintained their unbeaten status after two rounds in the Sahara Asian sub-junior (under-16) chess championships at the Avion Hotel here today.Top seed Tejas Bakre of India (Elo rating 2355) and Lim Yee Weng of Malaysia (2150) lead the field of 21 boys with two points each while Aarthie Ramaswamy, along with Manasi Dadarkar and Le Kieu Thien Kin of Vietnam, share the lead in girls'section.Among other Indians to win were Prathamesh Mokal in boys' and M Kavanna in girls'.Third seed Surya Shekhar Ganguly dropped another half a point in a 58-move draw with Iraqi Ghaem Maghaml Ehsan.Bakre, who finished runner-up to P Mahesh Chandran in the under-16 Nationals, had an equal position after Valay Parikh moved his knight into the e2 square. After a series of exchanges, Bakre had a good knight on the g6 square to Parikh's bad bishop on g2. That simplified the ending in favour of the former but Parikh kept on playing in spite of Bakre queening his pawn.On the second board, Soundarrajan Kidambi drew with Iraqi opponent Abdul Aziz in a game arising out of Caro Kann defence. Aziz, with white pieces, tried to break Kidambi's King-side but nothing came off it. In the end, with the minor pieces getting exchanged, both agreed to split points after 41 moves.On the third board, P Mahesh Chandran was held by counterpart S Satyapragyan in a French defence game. There was nothing for Mahesh who was playing with white pieces. He accepted a draw after being forced to repeat moves.In the girls', national under-16 champion JE Kavitha shockingly lost to Le Kieu Thien Kim of Vietnam. Kavita played very passively against Le's Caro Kann defence. After the Indian had pushed her rooks to the seventh rank, Le was threatening made with the queen and bishop when Kavita resigned after 34 moves.Aarthie Ramaswamy, who narrowly missed qualifying for the women's National A Championships a week ago, played the closed Sicilian defence against Yusubalieva Sevara of Uzbekistan. Yusubalieva did not develop her queen-side pieces and tried to attack and Aarthie duely punished her.With the arrival of a Mongolian, Batzorig Tuvshintugs, the strength in the boys' field went up to 21 giving the ninth Indian boy a chance to play in the championships.Results (2nd round)Boys: Valay Parikh (Ind, 2115) 1 lost to Tejas Bakre (Ind, 2355) 2; Ahmed Aziz (Iraq, 2185) 1.5 drew with S Kidambi (Ind, 2150) 1.5; P Mahesh Chandran (Ind) 1.5 drew with S Satyapragyan (Ind, 2175) 1.5; Lim Yee Weng (Mal, 2150) 2 bt Yulinato Erwin (Indo, 2095) 1; Subir Garodia (Ind) 1 lost to Anton Paulo Del Mundo (Phi, 2045) 1.5; Ghaem Maghaml Ehsan (Iran, 2235) 1 drew with Surya Shekhar Ganguly (Ind, 2285) 1; Wang Ji Jing (Mal, 2090) 0.5 lost to Prathmesh Mokal (Ind, 2210) 1; Khamrakulov Ibrokhim (Uzb, 2340) 1 bt Md Ruhul Islam Boby (Bang); Vo Minh Hoang (Viet) 1 bt Batazorig Tuvshintugs (Mong, 2130) 0; Gareth Charles (Aus) 0 lost to Nesterenko Nykyta (Kzk) 1Girls: JE Kavita (Ind) 1 lost to Le Kieu Thien Kim (Viet) 2; Manasi Dadarkar (Ind) 2 bt Leonova Maija (Kzk) 0; M Kavanna (Ind) 1 bt Yogita Yevle (Ind) 0; Yusubalieva Sevara (Uzb) 1 lost to Aarthie Ramaswamy (Ind, 2035) 2; Samanth Lee Heng Jun (Mal) 1 bt Shraddha Samani (Ind) 0
