Calcutta: India?s Abhijit Kunte sits pretty on 7 points, after the ninth round of the International Open Chess tournament here at Alekhine Chess Club, Gorky Sadan on Monday.

Kunte, who was jointly leading the fray with Aleksej Alexandrov, accepted the draw offered by GM Ehsan Ghaem Maghami of Iran to take his tally to 7 and stay in sole lead after Alexandrov went down to GM Ni Hua of China.

Alexandrov allowed his young Chinese opponent such an initiative in the opening that his position was clearly inferior as early as the 15th move and was forced to concede in 27 moves. Alexandrov and Ni Hua now trail Kunte half a point behind.

Enamul Hossain, in quest of his second GM norm, suffered a setback as he went down to city-based GM Dibyendu Barua in a Sicilian Pelikan. Barua won a pawn in the middle game, but Hossain had some compensation in the form of active pieces for the material deficit. Barua patiently activated his pieces as well as advanced his pawns on the kingside after which Hossain?s position collapsed.

The chief arbiter R.C. Chatterjee informed The Telegraph that Hossain can still earn his second GM norm provided he wins his next game or scores 1.5 in his next two rounds. Hossain, though has a tough opponent in Dao Thien Hai of Vietnam in the 10th round. Saptarshi Roy succumbed to Niaz Murshed of Bangladesh in a rook and pawn ending.

GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly gave Asia?s youngest GM Timur Gareev of Uzbekistan a lesson in the elementary bishop and knight versus lone king ending. R. Balasubramanium held GM Alexander Fominyh of Russia to stay on course for his maiden IM norm.

RESULTS: Round IX ? Ni Hua (6.5) bt Aleksej Alexandrov (6.5); Abhijit Kunte (7) drew Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (6); Dibyendu Barua (6) bt Enamul Hossain (5.5); Ziaur Rahaman (5.5) drew with Dao Thien Hai (5.5); S.S. Ganguly (6) bt Timur Gareev (5); Neelotpal Das (5) lost to Oleg Romanishin (6); Tejas Bakre (6) bt Sandipan Chanda (5); Niaz Murshed (6) bt Saptarashi Roy (5); R Balasubramanium (5) drew Alexander Fominyh (5); Devraz Chatterjee (4.5) lost to Abdulla Al Rakib (5.5); Reefat Bin Sattar (5.5) bt Nisha Mohota (4.5); R.R. Laxman (4.5) drew Dinesh Kr Sharma (5); D.V. Prasad (4) lost to K. Visweswaran (5); Somak Palit (3.5) lost to Nguyen Anh Dung (5); Vinoth Kumar (4) drew Rahul Shetty (4); Rahul Sangma (4) drew Kh. Islam Aminul (4); Arindam Mukherjee (4.5) bt Arman Monir (3.5); Mahtabuddin Ahmed (3.5) lost to Md. Javed (4.5); Satyajit Kundu (2.5) lost to Abu Sufian Sakil (3); Abhishek Das (3.5) drew Sandipan Chatterjee (3); Saheli Nath (2.5) lost to Abhratanu Datta (3.5) walkover; Ghader Pour Shayesteh (2.5) drew N.K. Mishra(3); K. Ramu (3.5) bt Souvik Chakraborty (2); Soumya Guha Thakurta (3.5) bt Bitan Banerjee (1).