Excelsior Sports Correspondent
JAMMU, Jan 5: The highest rated J&K player Soham Kamotra won J&K UT Senior Open Chess Championship comfortably by displaying a very high class game, here at Press Club Jammu.
He was awarded with glittering trophy and a cash prize of Rs 8000, while Sumit Grover clinched 2nd place as well as a cash prize of Rs 5000 while 3rd prize was won by Ashutosh Jamwal and was awarded with Rs 3000 cash prize followed by 4th place went to Khalid Amin, besides 5th place was secured by Adil Ashraf.
In the women category, Arushi Kotwal won 1st place and was awarded with a cash award of Rs 4000 and trophy, while Bismah Afshan won 2nd and Ojaswani Mengi stood 3rd. A total cash prizes of worth Rs.30000 were distributed among the winners.
In the junior open exposure event, Bazil Manzoor won 1st place, while Sohail Shaqeel stood 2nd and Usmaan Parray remained 3rd.
Secretary Sports Council, Nuzhat Gul was chief guest, while Principal Commissioner GST Mahesh Kumar Rustogi and Zorawar Singh Jamwal were special guests on the occasion.
The event was organized by All J&K Chess Association and sponsored by J&K Sports Council in Senior Men and Senior Women along with in U-19 Open.
All the matches were held under the supervision of president AJKCA Atul Kumar Gupta, while FIDE Arbiter Anil Kotwal was chief arbiter for this event and AR Wani, Mushtaq Ahmed Malik and Burhan Wani were arbiter/ technical experts for the event.
Arshid Ahmad Kolu secretary AJKCA, Khalid Amin, Baldev Raj, Kuljeet Singh Jamwal, Raj Kumar, Faisal Farooq and Ashiq Ahmed were among the prominent who graced the event.
This was the direct selection event for forthcoming Senior Men and Women Nationals. The event culminated with a vote of thanks which was presented by Senior Prosecution Officer Raj Kumar.