With Georgia likely to post a victory against overnight leader Kazakhstan, it seemed that the Indian eves were likely to regain the top position and become the firm favourites for the gold medal again.
Koneru Humpy defeated China's Zhu Jiner to jump into sole lead with 5.5 points after the seventh round of the FIDE Women's Grand Prix in Pune on Monday.
World Championship challenger Gukesh Dommaraju played out a hard-fought draw with Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia.
Nine-year-old Aarit Kapil from Delhi came close to defeating World No 1 Magnus Carlsen before settling for a draw in the 'Early Titled Tuesday' chess tournament on a leading online platform.
As Gukesh gears up for the Paris leg of the Freestyle Chess Tour, his latest interaction with the Botez sisters has sparked yet another meme fest online.
In the open section too the Indian men were poised for an easy victory against Hungary 'B' team. The hero of the day was Arjun Erigaise who played a brilliant attacking game against Peter Prohazska and ended with a checkmate after a queen sacrifice.
'The moment a movie was declared a hit, he would immediately start planning his next.'
Koneru Humpy's non-participation in the event has not hampered the team's chances much as Vaishali has jumped significantly in rankings and is a force to reckon with in the women's circle.
Indian Grandmaster D Gukesh, the youngest player ever to qualify for the World Chess Championship, held defending champion Ding Liren to a draw in their fourth-round encounter in Singapore on Friday.
Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa played out a draw with Duda Jan-Krzysztof of Poland to maintain joint lead with 3.5 points
It was a meeting of Chennai's finest when Ravichandran Ashwin met World Chess Champion D Gukesh at the M A Chidambaram stadium.
'When you are a pioneer and someone who's put on a pedestal, but then the pedestal gets dusty, people don't look at the statue anymore.' 'They would say, 'Yes, yes, of course I know Bimal Roy. He made Do Bigha Zamin.'.'
D Gukesh admires the way charismatic former India skipper MS Dhoni and iconic tennis player Novak Djokovic
Magnus Carlsen of Norway delivered a flawless performance on the final day to clinch the title in the Open section
Grandmaster Arjun Erigaisi scored his fourth victory on the trot and gave India an early lead in the match against Serbia in the fourth round of the ongoing 45th Chess Olympiad.
Seventy years after Pather Panchali released on August 26, 1955, we finally get it. Shuttling between the village of Boral and a studio in Calcutta, caught between worrying about the next purse of funds and wondering which item to mortgage next, Satyajit Ray was explaining Indians to themselves, discovers Sreehari Nair.
World number four Grandmaster Arjun Erigaisi registered his sixth victory in as many games as the Indian team was poised to score its sixth straight win in the ongoing 45th Chess Olympiad in Budapest, Hungary on Monday.
Norway Chess released a video of 18-year-old Gukesh with a tonsured head, giving it as an offering to Lord Balaji.
President Droupadi Murmu's address to the nation on the eve of the 79th Independence Day.
Superbet Classic: Praggnanandhaa in joint lead with three others
'Madhubala in Kala Pani looks divine and yet, she's not just there for glamour.' 'In Do Raaste, the character of Neelambari (played by Bindu) isn't a heroine in the traditional sense but she has such a pivotal role.' 'That Raj Khosla gave a non-heroine such a central role, instead of the heroine, says a lot about how he valued female characters.'
If you ask any young parent what they dread the most about planning their child's birthday, there'd be only one answer: Planning and buying return gifts, notes Divya Nair.
Having lost three and drawn three coming into the third and final day of rapid, Praggnanadhaa lost to Lenier Dominguez of the US in the seventh round.
R Vaishali also made it to the next round, defeating Ouellet Maili-Jade of Canada in another Indian victory of the day while Divya Deshmukh ousted Kesaria Mgeladze of Georgia.
Erigaisi may have had to work harder but the Indian youngster, who is currently World number four, was never quite away from winning his game.
'The Asian Chess Championship will give great exposure for young chess players. But the AICF is curtailing the number of Indian players with a strange rule.'
Vaishali defeated Muzychuk for the second time in the event in the Armageddon. It was a finely played Classical game wherein neither players could reach an advantage but in the Armageddon Vaishali took advantage of her better placed rooks to call the shots.
International Master, renowned trainer and a mentor to many aspirants, Varugeese Koshy, has passed away. He was 66.
With nine rounds still to come in the blitz event, Wei Yi has amassed 20.5 points with seven wins on the first day of blitz. Ending the day with 7.5 out of a possible nine, Yi, seems like a man possessed and unless a hurricane hits him, is poised to win the first leg of the Grand Chess Tour.
Following Arjun's win, World Championship challenger D Gukesh put it across Parham Maghsoodloo with black pieces, swindling the Iranian towards the end of the first time-control.
'The second Sunday after Sholay's release, Amjad and Shehla had taken Shadaab to Juhu beach. They were strolling leisurely when, to Shehla's shock, he suddenly picked up their son, grabbed her hand and pulled her along, urging her to run. They raced towards their car and had just managed to get in and lock the doors when all hell broke loose. Hundreds started banging on the car, shouting, 'Gabbar Singh bahar niklo!''
Nakamura, who started off as the favourite in the blitz section, is in sixth spot on 13.5 points, ahead of tour leader and compatriot Fabiano Caruana who has 13 points.
Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa bounced back from a poor start in the rapid section to climb to second place in the overall standings at the end of the first half of the blitz section in the Superbet Rapid & Blitz tournament.
Caruana became the sole leader and also got back to number two in live world rankings.
With a maximum of 11 games remaining under classical time control, the scores are tied at 1.5-1.5. This was after Liren won the opener and the second game ended in a draw.
'We can't care about the reasons or whatever happened to Hans. We don't care. We have to focus on our tournament.'
Russian chess Grandmaster Boris Spassky, who took French nationality in 1978, was the 10th World chess champion, holding the title from 1969-1972, when he lost it to American Bobby Fischer in Reykjavik in a contest later dubbed as the "Match of the Century".
Vaishali becomes India's 84th Grandmaster, joins brother Praggnanandhaa in elite club
The drawn match left both the players on an identical tally of 4.5 points each, still shy of 3 points in order to win the championship.
Both Caravaggio and Djokovic entered worlds ruled by giants, shattered conventions with defiance, and redefined greatness within the rigid lines of their craft. One with a brush, the other with a racquet but both turned their tools into instruments of disruption. And ultimate greatness.
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