MUMBAI, Dec 18: A hat-trick by medium pacer Rupam Malviya was instrumental in Union Bank recording their second successive outright win when they beat Bombay Customs by 163 runs in the Times Shield Division B on the third and final day at Sunder Ground, Cross Maidan here on Thursday.

Customs, set to score 267 for a win ,were all out for 103. Rupam Malviya was the wrecker-in-chief with six wickets for 34 runs including a hat-trick.In the morning, Union Bank, resuming their second innings at 155 for five, were all out for 280. Harish Shetty (96) and Arun Shetty (67) were the main scorers.

Debutants Varun Shipping registered their first outright win by defeating Indian Navy by 182 runs at Matunga. Centurian Aslam Shaikh and all-rounder Janak Mistry were the heroes.

Brief scores: Group A: Bank of India 191 and 324-7 decl (M Ingle 71, A Tendulkar 70, J Dadarkar 46; S Lad 3-43) bt Bank of Maharashtra 201 and 148 (A Menezes 4-22, Raju Shirke 4-52) by 66 runs; BoI 19 and BoM 9 pts.
B Arunkumar 316 and 93-5 drew with Dena Bank 396-8 decl (Prashan Sawant 93, K Pavri 33, S Kamluddin 40); Dena Bank 13 and B Arunkumar 8 pts.
Group B: Chowgule 208 and 159 bt Oriental Insurance 155 and 100 (R Kaushal 31; Avdoot Amonkar 6-34) by 112 runs. Chowgule 17 and Oriental 9 pts.
Union Bank 157 and 280 (Haish Shetty 96, A Shetty 61; Jude Singh 3-54, G Umesh 3-55, Dinesh Sabnis 3-90) bt Bombay Customs 177 for 9 decl and 103 (Bharat Karnik 31; Rupam Malviya 6-34 including hat-trick, Manish Sakhalkar 4-32) by 163 runs. UBI 17 and Customs 6 pts.
Group C: Reserve Bank 363 and 194 (V Patil 56, S Patil 32; J Bhosle 3-61) drew with BSES 307 for 6 (S Manjrekar 77, S Patil 44, K Dakshine 33, U Bhogle 33, J Barde n.o. 56). RBI 14 and BSES 7 pts.
Varun Shipping 303 for 8 decl and 241 (A Vincent 30, R Naidu 35, J Mistry 57, Aslam Shaikh 76; C D Thomas 4-70) bt Indian Navy 216 and 146 (M Z Khan n.o. 62; Janak Mistry 4-54, Umesh Patwa 3-57) by 182 runs. Varun 20 and Navy 6 pts.
Group D: New India Assurance 205 and 163 (P Dalvi 38, R Pandit 5-53, P Masurkar 4-38) lost to Mumbai Port Trust 311 and 60-2 by 8 wickets. MPT 17 and New India 6 pts.

Bhilare sole leader

At the end of the fifth round of the Senior Division Chess Tournament organised by the Bombay Chess Association at the Zandu Pharmaceutical Works canteen, Ganesh Bhilare emerged sole leader by defeating overnight joint leader Abhijit Bhurke. Bhilare alone has won all five games in a row. Half a point behind Bhilare, on 4.5 points each, are Subhash Honmurgi and Deepak Tandel.

Bhurke, with white pieces, played the Advance Variation against 10th seeded Bhilare's French Defence. Bhurke wasted four moves of knight and two moves of light square bishop of which Bhilare took advantage and brought his knight and bishop to queen-side and threatened the white rook. With a neat combination, Bhilare captured white rook for black knight, attacked weak square F-2 with his queen and two rooks and threatened to queen the D passer pawn. Bhurke resigned on 33rd move in a hopeless position.

Top seed Rohit Singh Rana and fourth seed M Srinath, after losing their first round games, have won four games in a row and now are on the third spot with four points each along with Bhurke, second seeded Pednekar Sudarshan, Paresh Gandhi, Santosh Borkar and Vilesh Bhat. Rana and Srinath defeated SJ Karmakar and Nikhil Bhat respectively. Gandhi, Borkar and V Bhat prevailed over Anil Arora, Nitin Nawar and Munish Kapoor respectively.

Kiran Pitale's aimless play gave Suhas Pednekar sufficient time to bring his queen and rook on H file and gain one exchange. Pednekar opened G file in front of white king and threatened to win one more bishop when Pitale resigned on 38th move in a hopeless position.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.