Grandmasters Pendyala Harikrishna and Tigran Petrosian (Armenia) and Zhao Jun (China) jointly lead the table with six points each after the seventh round in the World Junior Chess Championship in Kochi, on Tuesday.
Grandmaster Koneru Humpy of India is in second spot with 5.5 points.
On the top board, Harikrishna, who was the sole leader after six rounds, was held to a draw by fifth seed IM Radoslaw Wojtaszek of Poland in 43 moves.
Fourth seed Petrosian defeated third seed GM Evgeny Alekseev of Russia in a Sicilian dragon opening in 53 moves, while 12th seed Zhao Jun stunned Erwin L'Ami of The Netherlands in a Sicilian Pelican opening in 42 moves.
On the fourth board, Koneru Humpy shocked top seeded Grandmaster Ferenc Berkes of Hungary in a modern Benoni opening in 35 moves.
India's IM M R Venkatesh did well to hold seventh seed GM Timur Gareyev of Uzbekistan, while IM David Smerdon of Australia defeated Mark Paragua of The Philippines in 33 moves.
In the World Girls' Under-20 championship, played simultaneously, Anna Ushenina of Ukraine emerged sole leader with six points closely followed by Elisabeth Paehtz of Germany with 5.5 points.
Top seed Ekaterina Korbut of Russia, Saheli Nath and Eesha Karavade (both India) with five points each share the third slot.
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