SUBHASH MISHRA
Dhanbad, July 3: Rohan Vijay Shandilya of Jamshedpur with the highest 8 points bagged the 22nd State FIDE rating Aditya Birla Memorial Chess Championship title that concluded on Sunday evening at the Sarla Birla University Ranchi.
Bhudeo Tripathi of Ranchi and Ankit Kumar Singh of Bokaro got the second and third positions respectively with 7.5 points each in the championship.
Playing like a true champion Rohan Vijay Shandilya was the lone unbeaten player in the championship and earned the highest 8 points in 9 rounds. Only two players Bhudeo Tripathi and Ankit Kumar Singh held him draw in the seventh and ninth rounds respectively.
State champion Pritam Singh of Jamshedpur had not participated in this championship due to some official engagement.
After Rohan Shandilya, three players Bhudeo Tripathi, Ankit Kumar Singh and Adhiraj Mitra got equal 7.5 points each, but on the basis of progressive points Bhudeo got second and Ankit third position respectively and Adhiraj had to content with the fourth place.
Champion Rohan Sandilya got a cash prize of Rs 16,000 with a trophy while runners-up Tripathi Rs 11,000, Ankit Rs 8000, Vibhash Rs 5000.
Bhudeo Tripathi, who was the highest-rated (1937) player in the championship, was in the title race till last but defeat in the 8th round by Vibhash Kumar Sinha of Dumka watered down his chance. Vibhash got the fifth position with 7 points.
Ankit lost to Tripathi in the third round while Adhiraj Mitra went down to Rohan Shandilya in the eighth round.
Besides giant killer Vibhash Kumar ( who defeated Bhudeo Tripathi) four other players ( Saikat Dutta ( 1742 rating) of West Singhbhum, Souryadipta Sarkar of East Singhbhum, Ramesh Kumar of Bokaro and Shaswat Paul of West Singhbhum also got 7 points each and were left on sixth to ninth position.
Priyanka Kumari (5 points), Alka Das (6.5), Sikandar Anis (6.5) Manish Sharma (6.5), Harsh Jha (6.5), Deepak Saha (6.5) Madeep Mukhi (6.5), Raja Bose (6.5), Adarsh Kumar (6.5), K Kundan (6 points), Rohit ( 6) came on 10 to 20th position.
All Jharkhand Chess Association (AJCA) general secretary Manish Kumar said that the top 20 players were given cash prizes.
In the final ceremony, AJCA president Pradip Verma was the chief guest and gave away prizes to players. AK Singh, Alok Tripathi, Jalendra Kumar were also present. Treasurer Satish Kumar, international arbiter Dipak Kumar, Prabhat Ranjan Kumar, Binod Sab, Bikram Kumar, Arun Kumar, Vikash Mehta, Ashok Singh and Manish Masi conducted the championship.
