Meenakshi maintains lead; Harika at second spot

Chennai: Grandmaster S Meenakshi maintained her slender half point lead over top seed D Harika as both their respective matches ended in draw in the ninth round of the 36th National Women`s chess championship.

Meenakshi, who now has 7.5 points, was held to a fighting 73-move draw by WGM Esha Karvade of Maharashtra, while Harika was held to a 31-move draw by WGM Nisha Mohota of West Bengal. National sub-junior girl`s champion Bhakti Kulkarni of Goa, who was in the third place yesterday, played rather listlessly to lose to P Priya of Tamil Nadu.From an irregular Queen pawn opening, a typical isolated `Q` pawn position was reached where Bhakti, playing white, had attacking chances. But, Bhakti faltered at the middlegame and played a series of dubious moves. Priya handled the situation quite nicely to gain two pawns and duly exchanged queens in the process. The rest was just a matter of mere technique and Priya converted it into a point in 38 moves.Woman International Master Kiran Monisha Mohanty of Orissa scored an impressive win over WFM Bindu K Saritha of Kerala to move into the third spot with six points. Kiran, playing white, adopted the Anti-Marshall set up in the Spanish Opening. She then fixed a weakness on Bindu`s Queenside and then exchanged Queens on the 19th move with a nice tactic to obtain a clearly superior position. PTI