Indians keep dominating

Surya Sekhar Ganguly maintained his supremacy in the Asian Zonal Chess Championship at the end of the eighth round at the NSC conference room yesterday.

The Indian Grand Master won both his seventh and eighth round boards to keep his solo lead with 7.5 points. Ganguly beat Krishna Thapa of Nepal in the seventh round and later defeated Amir Karim of Pakistan.

Another Indian Grand Master Pentala Harikrishna, with 7 points, regained the second slot by defeating Bangladeshi GM Niaz Murshed in the seventh round. He later beat Svothayan of Sri Lanka in the eighth round.

In the other matches of the seventh round, GM Ziaur Rahman beat IM Enamul Hossain Rajib, IM Reefat Bin Sattar checkmated Amir Karim, IM S Kidambi defeated VTS Svothayan and GM Abhijit Kunte drew with IM Tejas Bakre.

In the eighth round games, Zia beat Kirshna Thapa, Rajib drew with Kunte, Reefat drew with Kidambi and Niaz lost to Bakre.

In the women's division, Indian IWM S Minakshee also maintained solo lead with a win against Syeda Shabana Parveen in the eleventh round yesterday at the same venue.

With the outcome, she raised her tally to 9.5 points while compatriot Swati Ghate followed her with eight points. Swati beat GM Aarthie Ramaswamy.

In the other matches, Zakia Sultan beat Zenobia Qadir and IWM Nisha Mohota drew with Eesha Karavade.