Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Awadh Chaitanya from Jabalpur has emerged as winner of Madhya Pradesh State Open Chess Competition.
Among the top 21 players in the main category, Chaitanya (Jabalpur) was ranked first, followed by Mishra Kamad (Jabalpur), Suraj Chaudhary (Bhopal), Utkarsh Agarwal (Jabalpur), Rishi Sonkar (Jabalpur), Piyush Ranjan Dubey (Gwalior) and others.
The top 4 players will now represent Madhya Pradesh in the National Chess Championship. A sum of Rs 21,000 , Rs 15,000, and 10,000 were given to the players who secured the first, second and third respectively.
Organised by Bhopal District Chess Association, the three-day competition was concluded with the grand finale in the city on Sunday. Nearly 364 players from various districts of the state have participated in it.
Besides, the youngest player award in the tournament was given to Neev Vaidya (Bhopal). Winners of different categories including Divyang, women, senior citizen and under-15, 13, 11, 9 and 7 were honoured.
In women's category, Pravi Singh Tomar (Ujjain), Aarna Chaubey (Bhopal) and Amrita Chaurasia (Sagar) were awarded respectively. In the Divyang category, Alankrita Shrivastava (Bhopal-Habibganj) was felicitated. In the senior citizen category, Ganpat Singh Keer, Anwar Azim Khan, and Harish Phoolwani (all three from Bhopal) were awarded.