Kumaran split point with Mohammed Nubairshah Shaikh to lead the table, while the latter along with Murali Karthikeyan, Diptayan Ghosh and Sidhant Mohapatra followed closely at the second position with 4.5 points each after six rounds.
Top seed Diptayan signed truce with second seed Karthikeyan after 38 moves while on the third board Mohapatra held Arvindh Chithambaram (4) for a creditable draw.
In the girls section, top two seeds M Mahalakshmi (5.5) and G K Monisha (5) had to settle for half a point each as the former held on to her slender lead.
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