Riya Sawant stands fourth In National Under 7

Goa's Riya Sawant stood 4th in the
Girls section of the National
Under 7 Chess Championships
which concluded in Lucknow today.
This exceptional performance
follows her brilliant effort in the National
Under 9 tournament in Bangalore last month
where she stood 8th in a very tough field.
Goan kids have been on a tear recently
with half a dozen top ten performances
in the Nationals over the last 1.5 months -
(Riya Sawant twice, Niraj Saripalli, Bhakti Kulkarni,
Ivana Furtado and Mohanan Harikrishnan).
Add to that we have Anurag Mhamal (12th),
Cyrus Perreira (14th), Tatvesh Sawant (15th)
and Urvi Bandekar (16th) and the entire
scenario in Goa becomes crystal clear!

Riya finished with 7.5 points and will have
the satisfaction of having finished
in the top 10 of two National tournaments
in the same calendar year. She is presently
being coached by V. Sivaswamy of Bambolim
Chess Club, the cradle of many Goan champions.

The President and the Secretary of the
Goa State Chess Association
congratulated Riya and her coach on her unique
accomplishment and wished her continued success
in the future. There will be a separate felicitation
function for Riya on her return to Goa.

The final standings of the all the Goans
participating in the tournament were as follows -

Girls section - Riya Sawant 4th, Urvi Bandekar 16th,
Vidula Dempo 25th.

Boys section - Tatvesh Sawant 15th, Sumukh Pinge 62nd.