India's second major casualty on the day was Aravindh Chithambaram who lost to compatriot K Venkatramanan after the second set of rapid games.
The other five games, hard fought, were drawn. World No.1 Magnus Carlsen and Andrey Esipenko trail the leaders by half a point.
Indian Grandmaster Vidit Gujrathi was held to a draw by 12-year-old Argentine sensation Oro Faustino in the first game of the second round of the FIDE World Cup in Panjim on Tuesday.
Vidit Santosh Gujrathi got off to a flying start, quickly winning her first round match in the World Junior Chess Championship, which commenced at Hotel Hyatt, in Pune, on Monday.
Grandmaster Diptayan Ghosh caused the biggest upset of the World Chess Cup, ousting former world championship challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia after winning the second game of the second round, in Panjim, on Wednesday.
Indian Grandmasters D Gukesh and Vidit Santosh Gujrathi bowed out of the FIDE World Cup chess tournament after losing to Norwegian Magnus Carlsen and Azerbaijan's Nijat Abasov respectively in Baku on Wednesday.
Defending champion and Grandmaster R Vaishali jumped into sole lead in the women's section
Magnus Carlsen concluded the first nine rounds with an impressive 6.5 points out of a possible 9.
Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand squandered away a good start and could just end Day 1 on a fifty percent score after the end of the fifth round of World rapid chess championship in Berlin.
Grandmaster Vidit Santosh Gujrathi came good when it mattered most and defeated Marius Monalache of Romania to emerge as the best performing Indian in the Cappelle La Grande International Chess tournament that concluded in Cappelle La Grande, France.
It took Gujrathi 40 moves to outwit Benjamin and now he shares the lead with six others. The fourth Indian to cross the 2700 ELO rating barrier, Gujrathi will face American Grandmaster Aleksandr Lenderman in the fifth round.
Apart from a place in the Candidates to be played in April next year in Canada, Vaishali got richer by US$25000 (Over Rs 20 Lakhs) while Vidit took home a whopping prize purse of US$80000 (Over Rs 66 Lakhs).
Indian men's team was held to a 2-2 draw by Iran in the fifth round of the Asian Games in Hangzhou on Tuesday.
India was held to a 3-3 draw by lower-ranked Mongolia in the sixth round as favourites China grabbed the top spot in Pool A in the FIDE Online Chess Olympiad on Saturday.
Gujrathi faced a reverse at the hands of his Kazakh opponent.
Harika lost 1-0 to China's Hou Yifan
Vidit Gujrathi crashed through the defences of Hans Moke Niemann of the United States to join the leaders' pack on 4.5 points.
Three of the four Indian Open team players are in line for gold and silver medals for the individual performance.
In the women's event, Padmini Rout, R Vaishali and Bhakti Kulkarni posted wins in the first round. D Harika will be joining them in the second round, courtesy a bye in the first round.
Carlsen, whose form has been up and down in the preliminary phase, took the fifth place with 26 points. He tripped Duda in the final round after settling for draws in rounds 13 and 14 against Daniel Naroditsky and Giri.
An "embarrassed" All India Chess Federation (AICF) has filed a police complaint after a Chess Olympiad trophy its team won in the last edition of the tournament at home went missing from its office, forcing the sports body to arrange for a replica of the prized possession and tender an apology.
India's Padmini Rout scored an impressive victory with plenty of fireworks to maintain her joint lead in the Girls section but favourite Viddit Santosh Gujrathi suffered a shock loss in the sixth round of the LIC World Junior Chess championship in Pune.
Lesser-known Indian players continued to impress, while the fancied struggled to score, even as overseas Grandmasters took charge in the third round of the World Junior Chess Championships, being played at Hotel Hyatt, in Pune, on Wednesday. S L Narayanan was one of the early finishers, holding second seed and super GM Robin Van Kampen (2641) to a draw, while 10-year-old Nihal Sarin's impressive display again won him many admirers after he held Balazs CSonka (2409) to a draw to remain unbeaten after three encounters against opponents rated higher than 2400.
Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa defeated compatriot Arjun Erigaisi 5-4 via the sudden death tie-break to enter the semifinals of the FIDE World Cup chess tournament in Baku on Thursday.
The 18-year-old also created history as he surpassed the legendary Viswanathan Anand to take the No 1 spot among Indian chess players in the live ratings.
With seven rounds still to come in the first super tournament of the year, Anish Guru maintained his sole lead on 4.5 points out of a possible six and he is now trailed by Iranian turned Frenchman Firouza Alireza who is on 4 points.
Indian Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta suffered a shock defeat at the hands of Kaido Kulaots of Estonia and went out of contention for a podium finish after seventh round of the 31st Cappelle La Grande international chess tournament in Cappelle La Grande, France.
Erigaisi is currently in fifth place after eight rounds.
Teenaged Grandmaster D Gukesh has replaced the legendary Viswanathan Anand as India's top chess player after more than three decades.
Indian men won the Asian Nations Cup Chess tournament with a 3-1 victory over Vietnam in the final round as they pushed formidable China down to second place in Vietnam on Wednesday.
Former World champion Viswanathan Anand ended the World Rapid Championship on a positive note, scoring four points out of five games on the final day, but the Indian ace could only finish 25th in the final standings.
Lesser-fancied Indians again stole limelight in the LIC World Junior Chess Championships, being played at Hotel Hyatt, in Pune, on Friday. Nandhidhaa PV created a sensation in the fifth round, upsetting IM Meri Arabidze of Georgia, who is rated and titled higher than her, while 15-year-old Maria Ivana Furtado shocked Nguyen Thi Mai Hung to emerge joint leaders.
Padmini Rout has 6.5 points, one behind the leader, Sarasadat Khademalsharieh, in the girls' section at the World Junior Chess Championships in Pune.
Four draws and two wins on Under-20 boards helped India pull off the victory against the Chinese.
In the women section being held alongside, Indian women played out a hard-fought draw against experienced Georgia 1 team. All the games were drawn.
Adhiban will face the winner of the match between Vidit Santosh Gujrathi and Alexander Fier, who play the tiebreak on Saturday.
Arjun Erigaisi is in joint lead with 4.5 points from five rounds along with World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen and Vladimir Fedoseev after holding the Norwegian superstar in round five.
Meanwhile in the women's event, Padmini Rout and R Vaishali joined compatriot Bhakti Kulkarni in the second round.
'The Indian Open team was extremely well prepared and motivated to win the gold medal.' 'With two players in the world top 10 club, and four players with over 2,700 ELO points (GMs Arjun Erigaisi, D Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa, all below 20) and Vidit Gujrathi and P Harikrishna, it was a solid team.'
Grandmaster Arjun Erigaisi pipped Rinat Zumabayev of Kazakhstan in the fifth round to share the top spot.
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