Dibyendu Barua in sole lead

New Delhi, Jan 17 (UNI) Grandmaster Dibyendu Barua emerged as the sole leader defeating Arghyadip Das in the fifth round of the fifth Parsvnath International chess tournament here today.

With his fifth victory on the trot, Barua remains the only player in the field having won all games in the event so far and is now trailed by a wolf pack of 13 players including top seeded GM Alexey Dreev of Russia.

The upset galore continued for another round and reigning National champion GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly joined the casualty list in the fifth round. Ending a winner against him was finally-coming-off-age G Rohit who played a finely crafted endgame to come out triumphs and take his tally to 4.5 points. After the loss Ganguly left a lot a ground for himself to cover, remaining on 3.5 points. Just five rounds remain in this Rs. 8.75 Lakhs prize money tournament.

It turned out to be an interesting duel on the top board between GM Abhijit Kunte and GM norm holder Abhijeet Gupta wherein the latter missed some winning chances before signing the peace pact.

Earlier in the fourth round, Kunte continued with his winning ways and defeated talented youngster S P Sethuraman.

In a major upset day, V Haribalu outwitted Grandmaster Neelotpal Das from a difficult situation.

UNI