Ramesh wins Parsvnath chess

The Chennai-based player, who gained his third and final GM norm in the 11-round tournament, ended up joint leader along with Russian GM Alexander Fominyh and GM Marat Dzhumaev of Uzbekistan but was declared winner on the basis of better progressive score.

The trio, who ended with nine points each from a possible 11, will share the prize-money and go home richer by Rs 66,666 each.

Ramesh opted for a Sicilian opening against Jha and had a winning position by the 18th move as he went on to take the match in 30 moves.

But the biggest loser of the day was overnight joint leader Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna, who not only lost an all-important point by virtue of his defeat to Dzhumaev, but also lost more than Rs 60,000 since he ended up eighth in the final standings.

The youngest Commonwealth champion looked on course to take the full point he needed to join Ramesh in the lead but the Uzbek GM, who had yesterday defeated top seed GM Dmitry Svetushkin of Moldova, held on to reverse the course and finish as joint leader.

Another overnight leader, Fominyh, had no such blues against GM Tahir Vakhidov of Uzbekistan as he won the tie in 48 moves.

IM Neelotpal Das took a big leap on the final day of the Rs 300,000 prize-money tournament, as he got the better of GM Jonathan Rowson of Scotland to finish fourth in the overall standings.

Das, playing with black pieces, opted for the Petroff defence against the GM and played with flair to earn full points.

Meanwhile, Grandmaster Koneru Humpy, who had a disastrous tournament, finished joint 49th along with Amardeep Bartakke and Vedant Goswami.

While Ramesh achieved his last GM norm in the tournament, Abhijeet Gupta of Rajasthan and R Balasubramanium of Integrated Coach Factory made their maiden International Master norms.

Important final round results (All Indians if not mentioned otherwise): P Harikrishna 8.0 lost to M Dzhumaev (UZB) 9.0, A Fominyh (RUS) 9.0 beat T Vakhidov (UZB) 7.5, R B Ramesh 9.0 beat Sriram Jha 7.5, J Rowson (SCO) 7.5 lost to Neelotpal Das 8.5, S Iuldachev (UZB) 8.5 beat Niaz Murshed
(BAN) 7.5, S Ovsejevitsch (UKR) 8.5 beat R Balsrubramanium 7.5, S S Ganguly 8.5 beat Atanu Lahiri 7.5, Lanka Ravi 8.0 drew S Poobesh Anand 8.0, D Svetushkin (MDA) 8.0 beat Abhijit Gupta 7.0, Deep Sengupta 8.0 beat M R Venkatesh 7.0.

Final placings: 1-3, R B Ramesh, Alexander Fominyh, Marat Dzhumaev 9.0; 4-7, Neelotpal Das, S Iuldachev, S S Ganguly, Sergei Ovsejevitsch 8.5; 8-13, P Harikrishna, D Svetushkin, Lanka Ravi, Rahul Shetty, S Poobesh Anand, Deep Sengupta 8.0.