Nine-year old Hetul Shah made history in the first round of the 7th Parsvnath International Open chess tournament defeating Grandmaster Nurlan Ibrayev of Kazakhstan, in New Delhi on Sunday.
Shah betterd Parimarjan Negi's record of being the youngest Indian to beat a GM by more than a year. Negi was 11 years old when he beat Grandmaster Ivan Nemet in the Biel Open in 2004.
The first round also turned out well for other Indians with six-time national champion Surya Sekhar Ganguly, Negi, GMs Abhijit Kunte and Dibyendu Barua starting with victories. Ganguly, who lead the Indian contingent, made short work of
compatriot Niraj Saripalli while Kunte got past DK Chopra and Barua defeated Dinesh Kumar Gupta.
Negi had to work a little harder before beating Vasanta Wettasinha of Sri Lanka.
In the other boards, top seed Grandmaster Areshchenko Alexander of Ukraine opened his campaign with an easy win over India's Dasharathi Sahoo.
Important Round I results (Indians unless stated): Hetul Shah (1) bt Nurlan Ibrayev (0, Kaz); Dasharathi Sahoo (0) lost to Areshchenko Alexender (1, Ukr); Yuriy Kuzubov (1, Ukr) bt P Chakrapani (0); Niraj Saripalli (0) lost to Surya Shekhar Ganguly (1); Parimarjan Negi (1) bt Vasanta Wettasinha (0, SL); Sitaram Agarwal (0, Nep) lost to Yuri Solodovnichenko (1, Ukr); Evgeny Gleizerov (1, Rus) bt M Natarajan (0); DK Chopra (0) lost to Abhijit Kunte (1); Samunder Kumar Girsa (0) lost to Saidali Iuldachev (1, Uzb); Safin Shukhrat (1, Uzb) bt Rauniyar Rakesh (0, Nep).