Indian grandmaster Surya Sekhar Ganguly on Tuesday emerged the winner of the Fischer Random event at Biel Chess Festival here with compatriot S P Sethuraman finishing second.

The 39-year old GM from Calcutta scored 6.5 points from 7 rounds to take the top prize ahead of Sethuraman (5.5 points) and French Woman Grandmaster Vera Nebolsina (5.5 points).

Ganguly remained unbeaten through the seven rounds, securing six wins and one draw with Alexandra Kosteniuk.

His wins came against Arashavir Musaelyan (Switzerland), Sai Kalluri Hari Charan (India), Robin Angst (Switzerland), Jose Antonio Herrera Reyes (Spain), Sethuraman and Konstantinos Ragios (Greece).

Sethuraman had to settle for second place as a defeat to Ganguly hurt his chances.

Indian teenager GM D Gukesh will be in action in the Rapid event as part of the Grandmaster Triathlon and the eight-player classical event for GMs.

The eight-player GM field includes Vincent Keymer (Germany), UAE’s Salem Saleh, American Gata Kamsky and China’s Yu Yangi.

Russia face Paris ban

Athletes from Russia and Belarus may not be allowed to compete at the Paris 2024 Games over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, senior International Olympic Committee (IOC) member Craig Reedie said. The IOC issued guidance to sports governing bodies in February to remove the two countries’ athletes from competition.

“A decision is going to have to be taken on what happens to these two countries, and my guess is that the general feeling would be that they should not qualify,” Reedie said.