Records controversial victory over Aarthie

At the other boards, talented Pullela Harikrishna made a vain bid to best an off-colour Sergey Ionov but the Russian GM’s tenacity in the endgame frustrated the young Indian IM. After the draw Hari moved to 5.5 and shared the third spot with Abhijit Kunte, Sasikiran and Vijayalakshmi.

Harikrishna will play IM Surya Sekhar Ganguly (4.5) tomorrow while Sasikiran (5.5) runs into formidable Vladimirov and Viji takes on IM DV Prasad (5). The 13th and the final round on Friday should be full of action.

CONTROVERSIAL WIN: Vijayalakshmi was involved in a controversy against Aarthie Ramaswamy, her roommate here. In a Ruy Lopez opening, Viji, with blacks, gave away a pawn to activate his pieces. Aarthie, who has been in very poor form, tread cautiously and managed to retain the extra pawn till a rook-pawn ending was reached. Viji managed to capture Aarthie’s rook with her ‘b’ passer. But Aarthie correctly promoted one of her three pawns to a knight (Queening that pawn would have resulted in a mate). At this stage it was a drawish.

But Aarthie, with over 40 minutes on clock, needlessly swindled time and claimed a draw with only two minutes left on her clock. Arbiter Nasiruddin Ghalib refused to buy Aarthie’s claim of a draw game and asked her continue. With time running out she lost in time. Aarthie, however, claimed that she was misguided by the arbiter. It required chief arbiter PT Ummer Koya’s intervention to settle the matter. Koya, after hearing the player’s version, declared that Aarthie lost on time.The decision may have looked harsh but the mistake of Aarthie was her ignorance of law. ‘‘I do agree it would have ended in a draw. But all she was needed to do was to make a few obvious moves and claim a draw when there was all the time in the world for her. I did that mistake against Fominyh earlier in the tournament,’’ said Viji. She then added: ‘‘There wont be in the problems between in the room.’’ Viji is now in the third place. A win here tomorrow against Prasad might end her in the third place. ‘‘I needed this win. Now I have a chance to finish third,’’ said Viji.

RUTHLESS VLADIMIROV: Vladimirov, having already won the title, wanted to play for fun today. But there was more than fun for him. Chanda was uncharacteristically erratic today. In Ruy Lopez game, Chanda’s miscalculation in the opening led to loss of a pawn on the 18th move. It was a crucial pawn and its loss proved costly for him. Chanda went out of ideas as Vladimirov mounted an attack on Queen side. Threatened with loss of more pieces, Chanda threw in the towel.

SASI BLUNDERS: The Sasikiran-Ionov game was crucial for the final result of the tournament. It was virtually a contest for the second place. In the Slav Defence the players reached a double-edged middle game. Sasikiran won a piece but lost three pawns. With a full Rook up, Sasikiran had a fine continuation but Fominyh had found a good counterattack. Sasi made a blunder and missed a chance to beat Fominyh who has not lost a game in the tournament. Fominyh is certain to finish second as he faces Aarthi tomorrow.

Earlier, DV Prasad and Abhijit Kunte settled for a friendly draw.

Results (12th round): P Harikrishna (5.5) drew with S Ionov (4), S Chanda (4.5) lost to E Vladimirov (9), K Sasikiran (5.5) lost to A Fominyh (6.5), A Ramaswamy (1) lost to S Vijayalakshmi (5.5), DV Prasad (5) drew with A Kunte (5.5), SS Ganguly (4.5) had a bye. M Sorokin (4.5) finished his matches.