Bhakti, Anurag and Hari for Commonwealth Chess

Riding on the success of her victory in the
National Junior Girls Chess Championship in
Nagpur, WFM Bhakti Kulkarni will be participating
in the the Parsvnath Commonwealth Chess
Championship 2007, which would be hosted by the
Delhi Chess Association at 'Khelgaon' from 2nd to
10th December 2007. Also present with her from Goa
will be State Champion Anurag Mhammal and 4th
in the National Under 9 Mohanan Harikrishnan.
The tournament, which will be a full fledged norm
event, has attracted a record 275 players till
date with entries still pouring in.

The mini-version of the Commonwealth Games 2010,
which is scheduled at the same venue, has attracted
the cream of chess talents from 11 Commonwealth
countries; Australia, Bangladesh, England, Malaysia,
Pakistan, Republic of South Africa, Singapore,
Sri Lanka, Trinidad & Tobago, Maldives and host India.

The field includes 13 Grandmasters (GM);
5 Women Grandmasters (WGM), 40 International
Masters (IM), 5 Women International Masters (WIM),
5 FIDE Masters (FM) and 3 Women FIDE Masters (WFM),
which adds to nearly 70 titled players who would
be vying for a prize fund of US $ 20000 with
the winner pocketing US $ 4000 in this 10-round event.

There are more than 15 titled players and 20 FIDE
rated players from outside the country have confirmed
their participation in the tournament, which is
excellent news for norm seekers including Bhakti
and Anurag. Bhakti will be defending her Commonwealth
Under 18 Girls title which she won in Mumbai last year
as well as trying to earn some valuable ELO rating
points which will get her to cross 2200 mark.
This incidentally will be the first international
tournament for young Harikrishnan who won the
Sangli Under 9 Boys title in fine style.

The pride of seeding goes to Indian national champion,
GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly who is rated 2585 followed by
GM Gawain Jones of England (2567). However, the star
attraction of this tournament would undoubtedly be
hitherto world's youngest Grandmaster, 14-year old
Parimarjan Negi (2514) whose wonderful exploits has
made the chess world follow his progress. Jones and
Negi, who are below 20, are one of the world's
young exciting talents.

On the women's front, the glamour girl of Indian chess,
WGM Tania Sachdev (2413), who has recently won the
Indian national Women's championship for the second
consecutive time, would be posing tough challenge
to the top women's players, IM Dronavali Harika (2480)
and WGM Nisha Mohota (2416).

The tournament is sponsored by Parsvnath Developers Ltd,
which has made Delhi as the one of the top chess
destinations in the world. The travel partner of the
event is Indian Airlines.