Valsad: Grandmaster Surya Sekhar Ganguly on Friday won the 44th National A Chess Championship for the fourth consecutive time by drawing his last round game.

The 23-year-old employee of the Indian Oil Corporation Limited remained unbeaten throughout the championship to pocket the winning amount of Rs 67,000 from a total prize money of Rs 2.75 lakh.

Surya Sekhar finished on top of the table with a score of nine points from 13 rounds. He drew Friday’s game against GM Neelotpal Das.

Grandmaster Deepan Chakravarthy emerged second in the tournament and pocketed a cash prize of Rs 50,000 while International Master Arun Prasad came third.

Both Deepan and Arun drew their respective games against Rohit G and Suvrajit Saha, respectively, and finished on 8.5 points each.

The young brigade of untitled players Rohit, IM Suvrajit and newly-crowned IM G.N. Gopal were not far behind with eight points each.

GM Abhijit Kunte, GM Neelotpal, IM Saptarshi Chowdhury also scored eight points but could secure positions from 7-9 respectively due to the inferior tie-break.

The biggest casualties of the championship were GM Dibyendu Barua and GM Pravin Thipsay. Both of them are former national champions and had represented the country on numerous occasions. But their show in the competition was dismal as they didn’t even make it to the top 12 positions.