The 29-year-old Anand crushed Nikolic in rapid play to maintain his lead in the section with six points and was then content with a 21-move draw in blindfold section for a 1.5-0.5 score, which gave the Indian world No 2 an aggregate of 9 points and lifted him by two places from overnight sixth.

Russian world No 3 Vladimir Kramnik maintained his overall lead by defeating Fide world champion Anatoly Karpov 1.5-0.5, winning in rapid play before playing out a long drawn 70-move draw in blindfold.

With three rounds left in this 11-round 12-player event boasting a prize fund of $137,250, Kramnik has seven results of 1.5-0.5 with only one draw.

Anand, who was held to a draw by Joel Lautier of France in the previous round, beat Nikolic in rapid play in a RuyLopez game before drawing a Queen's Gambit accepted variation game in the blindfold section.

Anand has only a disappointing three points from the blindfold games, but has brought himself into a position from where he can hope for honours going into the final stage.

Kramnik leads the field with 11.5 points, followed by Alexy Shirov of Spain and Vasselin Topalov of Bulgaria (both 10.0). Anand and Lautier had 9 points each with Karpov (8.5) lying sixth.

Kramnik's resounding show in blindfold has pushed him on top of the table in that section, half a point ahead of Shirov with 6.5 points, and he looks well placed to clinch his first title of the year.

Fellow Russian and world's strongest player Garry Kasparov has already annexed two big events at Wijk aan Zee and Linares, where Anand was second and third respectively.

Kramnik has 6.5 points out of eight in blindfold and five out of eight, second behind Anand, in rapid.

His 11.5 points out of 16 is a clear 1.5 points ahead of Topalov, who beat Lautier,and Shirov.

Rapid play standings: Anand (Ind - 6), Kramnik (Rus - 5), J Lautier (Fra) and V Topalov (Bul) both 4.5; L Van Wely (Hol), J Piket (Hol), A Shirov (Esp) 4 each; L Ljubojevic (Yug), A Karpov (Rus) and V Ivanchuk (Ukr) 3.5 each; Boris Gelfand (Blr) 3.0, P Nikolic (Bih) 2.5.

Blindfold: V Kramnik (Rus) 6.5, A Shirov (Esp) 6, V Topolov (Bul) 5.5, A Karpov (Rus) 5.0, J Lautier (Fra) 4.5, P Nikolic (Bih) 4.0, V Ivanchuk (Ukr) 3.5, V Anand (Ind) and B Gelfand (Blr) 3, J Piket (Hol) and L Ljubojevic (Yug) 2.5 each; L Van Wely (Hol) 2

Overall standings: V Kramnik 11.5, Shirov and Topolov 10, V Anand and Lautier 9, A Karpov 8.5, Ivanchuk 7, Nikolic and Piket 6.5 each, Ljubojevic and Van Wely 6, Gelfand 6.