Girish Koushik wins the biggest trophy of his chess career
The Chess fraternity experienced one of its finest Chess Tournaments with the third Edition of Bangalore Open - a crowd funded FIDE Rating Chess Tournament organised by Innovators Chess Academy at Silicon City Academy of Secondary Education from 17th-21st April 2019. The hot favourite, IM Girish A Koushik won the event with a score of 9.5/10, a full point ahead of the runner-up IM M Chakravarthi Reddy 8.5/10 and second runner-up FM Niranjan Navalgund who also finished at 8.5/10. Girish won a cash prize of ₹50000 and a huge Trophy. The five-day, ten round tournament witnessed the participation of 389 players from all over the country and three different federations. Photo: Sushrutha Reddy
Girish Koushik wins another big one at Bengaluru
Speaking after the Prize Distribution ceremony, Girish said that the two Trophies of Innovators Chess Academy are truly innovative and he now has a special place in his house (he won last year's Karnataka State Chess Championship) for them.
For more Prize Distribution and Tournament photos, click here.
The tournament had 53 Parents and Chess aficionados coming together to fund ₹5000 each with the whole objective being to organise an Open FIDE Rating Chess Tournament in Bangalore. This translated into 53 like-minded people who took ownership of the event which eventually culminated in an astounding 99.9% positive feedback from the participants.
The success of the pilot project inspired the Organiser, Sushruta Reddy, to immediately announce the fourth edition of Bangalore Open next year with a much higher prize fund. International Arbiters Vasanth B H and Saleem Beig ensured all the Rounds (including Round one) started on time, thus acting as catalysts in the organisation of a successful Chess Tournament.
The Tournament attracted 389 participants with a total of three Federations India, USA and England, which meant an International norm each to the FIDE Arbiters - Karthik Shetty and Murugasundaram K. The venue, Silicon City Academy of Secondary Education has become a bee hive of Chess activities in Bangalore - with more than 75 Chess Tournaments being organised in the last seven years. Due credit must be given to the dynamic Principal of the School, Sumalini Laguve, for all the Chess Tournaments that the School has hosted and organised.
Akshayakalpa provided its newly launched butter milk to all Parents and players during the Tournament. Ravi Lakshman, Secretary of Silicon City Academy of Secondary Education, gave away the Prizes with 8 other donors of Bangalore Open in a glittering Prize Distribution ceremony.
Final Ranking after 10 Rounds
| Rk. | SNo | Name | Typ | sex | Gr | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | |
| 1 | 1 | IM | Girish A. Koushik | IND | 2437 | 9,5 | 0,0 | 65,5 | 70,5 | |||
| 2 | 2 | IM | Chakravarthi Reddy M | IND | 2400 | 8,5 | 1,0 | 66,5 | 71,5 | |||
| 3 | 3 | FM | Navalgund Niranjan | IND | 2352 | 8,5 | 0,0 | 65,5 | 70,5 | |||
| 4 | 14 | Anilkumar O.T. | IND | 1975 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 65,5 | 70,0 | ||||
| 5 | 5 | FM | Yashas D. | IND | 2273 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 65,0 | 70,5 | |||
| 6 | 7 | Senthil Maran K | IND | 2163 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 63,5 | 68,5 | ||||
| 7 | 9 | Alan Diviya Raj | U16 | IND | 2032 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 60,0 | 63,0 | |||
| 8 | 21 | Sudarshan Bhat | IND | 1833 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 59,0 | 64,0 | ||||
| 9 | 40 | Arhan Chethan Anand | U11 | IND | 1614 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 59,0 | 60,5 | |||
| 10 | 23 | Sanjay S Pillai | IND | 1794 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 58,5 | 63,0 | ||||
| 11 | 25 | Harikrishnan A (Kottayam) | IND | 1769 | 8,0 | 0,0 | 58,0 | 61,0 | ||||
| 12 | 4 | IM | Saravana Krishnan P. | IND | 2351 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 61,0 | 66,0 | |||
| 13 | 12 | Parthasarathy R | IND | 1989 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 61,0 | 65,5 | ||||
| 14 | 18 | Gavi Siddayya | IND | 1861 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 64,5 | ||||
| 15 | 32 | Jaiswal Avi | USA | 1665 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 63,5 | ||||
| 16 | 22 | Keshav Kothari | U16 | IND | 1832 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 58,0 | 62,5 | |||
| 17 | 8 | Goswami Vedant | IND | 2111 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 58,0 | 62,5 | ||||
| 18 | 20 | Soham Dey | U16 | IND | 1837 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 58,0 | 61,5 | |||
| 19 | 15 | Jayachandra Srinivas Vellanki | U16 | IND | 1967 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 65,5 | 71,0 | |||
| 20 | 16 | Rakshith Srinivasan | U16 | IND | 1923 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 65,5 | 69,5 | |||
| 21 | 39 | Arnav Muralidhar | U11 | IND | 1620 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 62,0 | 67,0 | |||
| 22 | 24 | Srikrishnan P | U16 | IND | 1779 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 62,0 | 66,0 | |||
| 23 | 17 | Raghavendra V. | IND | 1889 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 61,5 | 66,5 | ||||
| 24 | 19 | Jagadish P | U16 | IND | 1847 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 61,5 | 64,5 | |||
| 25 | 6 | Kulkarni Vinayak | IND | 2200 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 66,0 | ||||
| 26 | 44 | Kalki Eshwar D | U16 | IND | 1583 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 65,0 | |||
| 27 | 26 | Amal Roozi | U16 | IND | 1756 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 64,5 | |||
| 28 | 33 | Roshan Hari | U16 | IND | 1647 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 60,5 | 63,5 | |||
| 29 | 27 | Sanjay Sindhia Mh | IND | 1737 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 60,0 | 64,5 | ||||
| 30 | 13 | Likhit Chilukuri | IND | 1977 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 59,5 | 64,5 |
The article was edited by Shahid Ahmed
About the author
Sushrutha Reddy is a well-known organiser who has been promoting chess at the grassroot level in Bangalore, Karnataka. Currently a chess coach at four schools, he has worked as the Joint Secretary of United Karnataka Chess Association and had been the chief arbiter at almost all tournaments in Bangalore held between 2000 and 2003. He is an occasional writer and had written the cover story on the Fischer-Spassky World Championship Match for The Week magazine in the past. Besides this, he owns the Innovators Chess Academy which has organised more than a hundred Chess Tournaments during the last thirteen years.
