AURANGABAD, JULY 21: IM-elect Neelotpal Das is making steady progress to claim the first prize bonanza of Rs 55,000 in the Rs 2 lakh prize money All-India Open Fide rating chess tournament in progress at the Marathwada Sanskritik Mandal, here.The teenager from Goodricke Chess Academy, Calcutta, maintaining his unbeaten record, still leads the field of 205 players with 6.5 points.Neelotpal today defeated Sandeepan Chanda, his own state and academy mate, in the Silican Scheveninger Variation and is followed by IM Lanka Ravi, IWM Nisha Mohota of West Bengal, TS Ravi of IOC and N Sanjay of Income-Tax, Mysore, at second spot with six points.Top seed RB Ramesh (IOC) along with five others, including three-time women's National `A' champion and IWM Subbaraman Vijayalakshmi of Indian Airlines, are at third place with 5.5 points apiece.The bespectacled Neelotpal overcame centre square pressure on him and forced Sandeepan Chanda to sacrifise his two pieces for a rook without gaining any white pawns. Thegame immediately tilted in the overnight sole leader's favour and not taking much time, Neelotpal comfortably won on the 37th move.However, an interesting game of the day was witnessed on the sixth board, where IWM Nisha Mohota (Elo 2198) once again was lucky to get away with a full point after her opponent Dinesh Sharma's (LIC, Elo 2327) claim of a perpetual draw was overruled by the chief arbiter Rajendra Sagar for being late. Nisha, after the semi-Slav defence opening and having a clear material advantage in the middle-game, found herself in time trouble. She repeated her queen's move twice so as to finish the required 40 moves in two hours. In turn, Sharma, sighting a chance to settle for a draw, also repeated his move of rook, thus setting the game for a perpetual draw. However, Sharma claimed the draw only after making another move out of a perpetual draw and was overrulled by the arbiter Sagar.Thereafter, Nisha deviated from the theory and played a good move of Rb 2 on the 48th to launch a Kingside attack. On the 50th, Sharma resigned.Top seed and IM RB Ramesh settled for a quick 23 move draw with GB Joshi of IOC. While IM Lanka Ravi of ONGC, Chennai, capitalising on his double bishop advantage in the middle game after the Queen's India defence forced Vedant Goswami of Rajasthan, who lost his queen in the end game of heavy material exchanges. And N Sanjay of I-T, Mysore, gained his attack from SS Ganguly's opening (Queen's Gambit accepted) mistake and developed a `d4' pawn to win in 42 moves.Viji won over Dipanjan of West Bengal after black resigned on the 54th move, coming under severe time pressure. Former world under-10 champion of P Harikrishna of Andhra Pradesh, gained his winning momentum back, defeating KN Solanki to be at fourth place with five points. Two IM norm holder Chandrashekhar Gokhale of Indian Airlines notched a full point against VS Negi, also of Indian Airlines, after drawing four of his previous games. Gokhale now has five points and is also placed at fourthspot.Important Results (7th round)Neelotpal Das (GCA) 6.5 bt Sandeepan Chanda (GCA) 5; IM RB Ramesh (IOC) 5.5 drew with GB Joshi (IAL) 5.5; IM Lanka Ravi (ONGC) 6 bt V Goswami (Raj) 5; N Sanjay (I-T) 6 bt SS Ganguly (GCA) 5; R Bandopadhyay (WB) 5 lost to TS Ravi (IOC) 6; IWM Nisha Mohota (WB) 6 bt DK Sharma (LIC) 5; Shankar Roy (E Rly) 5.5 bt Ketan Boricha (Del) 5; Dilip Pagay (Mah) 5 drew with IM N Sudhakar Babu (IB) 5; IWM S Vijayalakshmi (IAL) 5.5 bt Dipanjan Das (WB) 4.5; RK Mishra (MP) 5.5 bt S Kutwal (Mah) 4.5; VS Negi (IAL) 4 lost to CS Gokhale (IAL) 5; Suvarjit Shah (Rlys) 5 bt Swati Ghate (Mah) 4; KN Solanki (Mah) 4 lost to P Harikrishna (AP) 5.
