Three Grandmasters and 11 International Masters will be making smart moves across the board in an online blitz chess tournament starting this evening.

The event is being organised by All Jharkhand Chess Association (AJCA) in association with XONG.

Popular GMs R.R. Laxman, Harsha Bharathakoti, Karthik Venkataraman, Arjuna awardee IM D.V. Prasad along with 10 other IMs and two Women International Masters have confirmed their participation in the tournament.

The tournament is being conducted on the online platform of lichess.org and will start at 4 pm and will be streamed live on XONG’s YouTube channel.

"XONG" is a South Asian grassroot community-based eSports tournament organization. A brand of RouteToMarket Media India Pvt Ltd., XONG has conducted various eSports tournaments in South Asian countries, including India and Bangladesh.

Entry fee for the event has been fixed at Rs 500 and a sum of 50,000 will be distributed to the prize winners, said AJCA secretary IM Neeraj Kumar Mishra.

"We thought of conducting an online tournament since it is not possible to conduct one physically in Covid times. We are elated about the GMs and IMs participation," Mishra added.

Jamshedpur-based Mishra said results of the tournament will be announced after three days. The results will be evaluated on lichess.org to check for any traces of foul play whatsoever,” he added.

The state chess outfit had organised an offline senior state championship in Ranchi in March when the Covid-related situation was normal.