Swapnil scores upset win over Shirish

The Patils were in for a bad day. Shirish’s father, Vasant Patil was playing against defending champion Vilesh Bhatt also of Maharashtra. Vilesh saw luck favour him, when his opponent blundered his Queen in the middle game. From then on it was only a matter of formality and Vilesh wrapped up the game in 42 moves.

The game between Charudatta Jadhav of Maharashtra and N Siddaiah of Andhra Pradesh was a well fought out one with both players making no mistakes. After 48 moves of ding dong battle, the players smoked the peace pipe and agreed to a draw.

The best attacking play of the day featured Maharashtra’s Madan Bagayatkar. Playing against his statemate Sanjay Karandikar, Madan launched a fiercesome attack from the word go. All of Sanjay’s attempts to defend himself could not prevent Madan from queening his ‘d’ pawn, after which it was only a matter of time. Sanjay surrendered after 44 moves. Madan Bagayatkar has the distinction of being the first Indian to win a medal at the Chess Olympiad. Earlier this year he won the bronze medal playing on Board No. 2 at the Chess Olympiad held at Krakow, Poland.