Shikha Uberoi advanced to the second round of the Pacific Life Open tennis tournament in Indian Wells, on Thursday night, beating Japan's Akiko Morigami.

Uberoi maintained her stupendous form that had seen her come through the tough qualifying rounds of the 2.1 million-dollar event sanctioned by both the ATP and WTA Tours to thrash world no. 81 Morigami 6-4, 7-5 in the first round encounter.

Uberoi, ranked 147, next faces 27th seed and world number 41 Meghan Shaughnessy of the US.

Uberoi had earlier beat another Japanese, Saori Obata 6-3, 6-1, and Russia's 146th ranked Ekaterina Bychkova 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 in the qualifiers.

The Indian Wells event is a Tier-1 event and includes the world's top-ranked players including world number one Lindsay Davenport, Frenchwoman Amelie Mauresmo, Russia's Wimbledon champion Maria Sharapova and Elena Dementieva.