Harika keeps lead

Maria Sergeeva has only herself to blame for her defeat. After sitting pretty for a major part of the game, the ambitious Kazakhstan girl bo...

Maria Sergeeva has only herself to blame for her defeat. After sitting pretty for a major part of the game, the ambitious Kazakhstan girl bowed to experienced Indian Grandmaster Koneru Humpy in the third round of the 10th Asian Women’s Chess Championship at the Hotel Taj Residency here today.

The win helped Koneru Humpy to collect 2.5 points to share second position with Wang Yu, Xu Yuanyuan, Ruan Lufei (all China) and compatriot Aarthie Ramaswamy.

On the top board, Gu Xiaobing of China today shocked her team-mate and defending champion Li Roufan in a 39-move game to garner three points to lead the points table along with India’s Dronavalli Harika, who continued her winning spree for the third successive day. Today she quelled yet another Chinese challenge put up by Tian Tian, seeded 19. Yesterday, Harika had scored an upset win over China’s Zhao Xue.

No 16 seed Aarthie Ramaswamy of India warded off another Chinese challenge when she toppled third seed Wang Pin. Zhao Xue (2), Ruan Lufei (Seed 18) and Zhang Jilin (20) registered wins against Nisha Mohota, Bhagyashree Thipsay (both India) and Uzbekistan’s Malinicheva Lidiya respectively to cap a good day for China.

EXCLUSIVE: EC brings in feature to check misuse of identity to seek voter list deletions

Political Pulse1 hr ago

The Election Commission has launched a new 'e-sign' feature on its portal and app to prevent fraud. This comes after allegations of misuse of online voter deletion forms in Karnataka. The feature requires voters to verify their identity using their Aadhaar-linked phone numbers, reducing the possibility of fraud.

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