Bhakti Kulkarni, Vantika Agrawal maintain half point lead

Overnight joint leaders Bhakti Kulkarni of Goa and Vantika Agrawal of Delhi signed peace treaty in the fifth round Monday to maintain their slender half point lead at the end of fifth round matches of the 46th National Women Chess Championship currently underway here.

Playing with white pieces in a King's Indian defence game, second seed Bhakti Kulkarni had a slight advantage in the middle game, but failed to convert it to decisive effect and agreed to split the point with her 10th seeded rival after 59 moves.

On the second board, top seed Soumya Swaminathan of PSPB found Maharashtra's Mrudul Dehankar's defence a tough nut to crack and signed the peace treaty after 42 moves by three fold repetition of position arrived out of Tromposwky Attack.

In other important matches, six-time champion S Vijayalakshmi tried hard against her teammate Aarthie Ramaswamy, but settled for a draw after 73 moves, while third seed Divya Deshmukh of Maharashtra, after settling for half point .