Surya Sekhar Ganguly

New Delhi: Gogineni Rohit emerged the most successful Indian, claiming two norms as well as the second place finish in the Parsvanath International chess tournament, which was expectedly won by top seed Alexei Dreev of Russia here on Monday.

The 18-year-old Hyderabad teenager completed his third and final IM norm and maiden GM norm in a field of over 300 players, including 13 GMs.

Dreev, who has an Elo rating of 2658, defeated B. Adhiban in the 10th and final round to finish a clear winner with 8.5 points out of a possible 10.

Half a point adrift were seven players — Rohit, GMs Ahmed Adly of Egypt, Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh, four-time national champion Surya Sekhar Ganguly, IMs Enamul Hossain and Abdulla al-Rakib of Bangladesh and Vikramaditya Kamble.

Adly finished third followed by Rahman and Surya Sekhar after the tie was resolved under the Bucholz System.

After Rohit, Abhijeet Gupta and S. Arun Prasad, Adhiban became another Indian to complete formalities for an IM norm just by appearing on the top board today against Dreev.

Even though he lost, Adhiban engaged Dreev, who was playing with white, for over three hours to last 57 moves.

Adhiban maintained parity for quite some time and then went attacking his weak queen side pawns.

Surya Sekhar, who defeated Shukhrat Safin with black pieces in 46 moves, said he was satisfied with his performance. “I am satisfied because at the end I am winning some rating points. Eight points is not bad because initially I was not doing well,” he said. (PTI)