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Online Poker Site PoKeRMaNiA Signs Jaideep Sajwan as First Team Pro

A booming poker scene in India is proving fruitful for players and operators alike and the latest alliance that has emerged is the signing of pro Jaideep ‘JDsaz’ Sajwan (cover image) by online poker site PoKeRMaNiA.

The site is the brainchild of Abhinav Aditya & Avilash Chatterjee from Bangalore, and Hetal Desai & Jaydeep Dawer from Surat. All four are engineers and also share the same passion for poker, which got them to start this site in late February, 2016. “Our goal is to work on this sport to have a good name in our country and to remove the taboo of gambling attached to it from a layman’s perspective,” they inform.

PoKeRMaNiA has signed up Jaideep Sajwan as their first Team pro and the company representatives state that, “JD Saz has been a friend to all of us since quite some time and his online and live achievements are very evident, so we mutually decided to sign him for our Team. Discussions with him happened during the IPC in Feb. Hence association with him is our privilege.”

Sajwan, a Manipal student, is a well known regular and has a reputation for consistent scores, since he began playing in 2009. He has been playing live at Bengaluru poker clubs since 2014, with several wins to his credit. A regular at the India Poker Championship (IPC), Sajwan made a ninth place in the IPC January 100K Highroller and a third place in the IPC February 30K Main Event this year.

Online, he has mostly scored at PokerStars and switched to India sites ever since the boom last year. Currently, Sajwan is a forerunner in the OPN Challenger series.

The PoKeRMaNiA team informs that “Apart from being the Poker Face for Team PoKeRMaNiA, JD Saz is a great ambassador for the game.”

They expect to increase the team under Sajwan, “We also intend to make a larger team under the guidance of JD Saz pretty soon.”

The site will be hosting a MaNiA Big Bash Poker Championship from March 30 to April 3, with ₹28 Lakhs in guaranteed prizes, plus goodies in gadgets for the top 10 finishers on the leaderboard.

IPC Feb 2016: Chennai’s Mukesh Surana Wins 30K Main Event For ₹11.7 Lakhs, Krishna SM Takes Down 10K Turbo For ₹2.8 Lakhs

Mukesh Surana (cover image)was crowned champion of the India Poker Championship (IPC) February 30K Main Event for ₹11.70 Lakhs, after a deal with Aditya ‘bitti’ Agarwal, who took home ₹8 Lakhs for a second place finish.

Chennai-based Surana was ecstatic as he repeated, “It feels great, its just great, its just great,” post his win. Mainly playing live games, the 34-year old Surana came to the fore on the second day of the event, after keeping a low profile on the first day.

At the last 30K Main Event in October 2015, Amar Reddy, a cash games player had won his first title, upsetting the long roster of pros participating the event and once again a new face pipped the roster of regulars and pros to take the highlight IPC Main Event title.

Even as the Main Event played its finale, the last day of the IPC February edition saw the concluding 10K Turbo event find a champion in Krishna SM, who took home the title and winning prize of ₹280,000. IPC 10K opening event Sahil Chutani final tabled the event for ₹1,30,000 at a third place finish.

 

Main Event Recap

Day 1 of the event saw 196 players signing up for the event, leading to a prize pool of INR 47,04,000 and the top 21 players were set to make the money. After nine hours of play only 36 survivors remained for Day 2 of the event.

The second and final day of play saw a furious pace, despite small disruptions of electrical supply that plunged the poker room into darkness a couple of times.

Day 2 began with the IPC 60K Highroller 13th place finisher Asad D leading with a stack of 184,500. Abhisek Panda with 177,500 was right behind and ultimate winner Surana was fourth from top with 130,500. A number of strong contenders were still in the game though, with Danish Shaikh, Pawan Jain and Sailesh Lohia, among others.

Amrit Kalash was the first elimination within minutes of Day 2 play, in three-way skirmish between Panda and Surana. Barely 10 minutes later, Surana went on to eliminate Neelabh Baranga.

Eliminations continued at a furious pace, as the race to the money bubble was on in earnest. The bubble finally burst by 4.45pm, landing on Ujwal Rana. Rana moved all-in for 58,000. Naveen Valluri also moved all-in with . Rana had and clearly needed help. The flop was promising with the but the turn and river blanked out and Rana was the bubble boy at 22nd place.

By now Pavan Jain was leading the stacks with 385,000, Surana with 313,000 and Shaikh at third place with 270,000 were the top 3 stacks.

Aditya ‘bitti’ Agarwal was another consolidating his position, as he took two busts together. Jigar Patel moved all-in with a short stack of 12,000 and Sailesh Lohia moved all-in too for 24,000.

Jigar Patel

Sailesh Lohia

Aditya Agarwal

The board ran and Agarwal was on top, as Patel and Lohia were out at 20th and 19th places respectively.

Marhol Dzmitry was another chipping up as he first doubled up through Karan Khuslani, eliminating him at 17th place and then busting SP Behera at 16th place.

After the elimination of Naveen Valluri at 10th place, a final nine-handed table was ready to go by 8 pm.

 

Final Table Recap

It was Agarwal with 631,000 on top when the final table began.

IPC 30K Main Event Final Table
IPC 30K Main Event Final Table

Final Table Chip Counts

Seat Name Chips

9. Aditya ‘bitti’ Agarwal 631,000

5. Jaideep Sajwan 504,000

4. Riyaz S 328,000

6. Mukesh Surana 326,000

2. Vikram Kumar 284,000

3. Marhol Dzmitry 72,000

1. Pavan Jain 232,000

7. Danish Shaikh 217,000

8. Rajat Sharma 141,000

It was Pavan Jain who took an aggressive stance early on and after doubling up through Sharma and Riyaz S, eliminated Danish Shaikh at ninth place.

Surana took the next bust and sent the IPC 60K third place finisher – Riyaz S packing at eighth. A commendable performance by the Dubai-based player who made back-to-back final tables at the series.

In one of the most brutal bad beats of the series, Rajat Sharma was eliminated in seventh place by Jaideep Sajwan. According to our coverage, “Jaideep Sajwan moves allin for 393,000 and Rajat Sharma calls off from the big blind for 355,000.

Jaideep Sajwan

Rajat Sharma

Sharma has Sajwan dominated and its almost over on the flop . Only runner-runner eights can save Sajwan now and as luck would have it, he manages to catch lightning in the bottle with the on the turn and on the river. Sharma gets a bad beat and exits in 7th place.”

Marhol Dzmitry
Marhol Dzmitry
Rajat Sharma
Rajat Sharma

Pavan Jain then went on to eliminate Marhol Dzmitry at sixth place. By now Sajwan had the lead and he used it to bust Vikram Kumar at fifth, besides cutting short Jain’s tournament run at fourth place.

Pavan Jain
Pavan Jain
Vikram Kumar
Vikram Kumar

Sajwan’s force was short-lived as he was next to go in a three-way hand. Jaideep Sajwan moved all-in for 970,000 from the button and Surana called from the small blind.

Jaideep Sajwan

Mukesh Surana

The flop with brought good news for Sajwan, but the turn went south. Hoping for an ace, Sajwan only got on the river and he was out at third place for ₹5,40,000.

Jaideep Sajwan
Jaideep Sajwan

Soon thereafter, a heads up a deal was struck with Surana getting ₹9 Lakhs and Agarwal taking ₹8 Lakhs, with ₹2.7 Lakhs left for the winner. 10 minutes later the suspense was over and Surana had won the event. The final hand saw Surana open for 150K and Agarwal moved allin. Surana snap-called.

Mukesh Surana

Aditya Agarwal

The flop with was a harbinger of the finale. The turn with and the river with confirmed Surana’s victory and Agarwal was runner up for ₹8,00,000.

Heads-up action between Mukesh Surana and Aditya Agarwal
Heads-up action between Mukesh Surana and Aditya Agarwal

Final Table Results (₹)

1. Mukesh Surana – 11,50,000*

2. Aditya ‘bitti’ Agarwal – 8,00,000*

3. Jaideep Sajwan – 5,40,000

4. Pavan Jain – 4,01,000

5. Vikram Kumar – 3,00,000

6. Murhol Dzimtry – 2,20,000

7. Rajat Sharma – 1,74,000

8. Riyaz S – 1,37,000

9. Danish Shaikh – 1,10,000

*denotes heads-up deal

Congratulations to Mukesh Surana for winning the IPC 30K Main Event!

 

10K Turbo Recap

Krishna SM, who has been a regular at the IPC past many editions was finally vindicated, when he topped the 139-player field in the 10K Turbo to win the title and ₹280,000 in prize money. Sahil Chuttani, who won the IPC 10K Kickoff event four days ago, made a significant third place finish for ₹1,30,000.

The top 16 players made the money and a heads up deal was struck between Tanuj Moorjani and Krishna SM. It was decided that Krishna would get ₹250K and Tanuj 220K, with an additional ₹30K for the winner.

The final hand saw the two players with –

Krishna SM

Tanuj Moorjani

The board opened and Krishna SM was declared champion, with Tanuj finishing runner up.

Tanuj Moorjani (L) with IPC 10K Turbo Champion Krishna SM (R)
Tanuj Moorjani (L) with IPC 10K Turbo Champion Krishna SM (R)

Final Table Results (₹)

1. Krishna SM – 2,80,000*

2. Tanuj Moorjani – 2,20,000*

3. Sahil Chutani – 1,30,000

4. Andreas Linke – 1,01,000

5. Sekar V – 76,000

6. Niranjan NJ – 58,000

7. Zarvan Tumboli – 45,000

8. Anish Kila – 36,000

9. Charu Kaushik – 28,000

*denotes heads-up deal

Congratulations to Krishna SM on winning the IPC February 10K Turbo!

IPC Feb 2016: Spartan Team Pro Sangeeth Mohan Wins 60K Highroller, Aditya Sushant Finishes Runner-Up

Spartan Team Pro Sangeeth ‘Samoh’ Mohan (cover image) won the India Poker Championship (IPC) 60K Highroller for a sum of ₹14.1 Lakhs. The win came after a deal at heads up with Aditya Sushant, who collected ₹11.5 Lakhs for a second place finish.

For Mohan, the win has come after almost three years. The gentle giant had had a great run during 2010-11, after having been one of the lucky few to have received mentoring from pioneering Indian player, Aditya ‘Intervention’ Agarwal, who is now the country’s only and first PokerStars Team Pro.

Post the win, Mohan told PokerGuru, “It’s been one of the toughest field and topping it makes it remarkable for me as I had to prove to myself that I can play tournament poker as I used to before. I had two options, to try and play the new age poker or the poker I learnt from Adi (Aditya Agarwal). I decided to follow the latter strategy and what can I say, it paid off”.

Mohan’s win was an incredible tale of perseverance and strategy where he maneuvered his short stack with precision to get to the top. Speaking about the series, Mohan adds, “Its the extreme competetive mindset of players in IPC that makes this win as well as this series so prestigious in the country. Every poker enthusiast wants to win an IPC event and thats what makes it special for me“.

Sushant also comes from Agarwal`s mentorship stable and has had a frustrating past year, where he played well, but never quite made any top spot.

Day 2 began with Sushant leading the 36 survivors and after a long time it was a day that had pros taking the top spots, with a final table made up of known regulars, as against the recent slew of newcomers winning at the IPC series.

Play began at 3pm and within ten minutes Arun Poply was eliminated at 27th place, followed by Jaideep Sajwan and Apoorva Goel at 26th and 25th place respectively.

The race was to make the money line, and in the top 14 that would get paid. About an hour into play, Mohan who was the sixth smallest stack, got a timely double up from Sahil Agarwal, which was the turning point for his fortunes.

Sangeeth Mohan

Sahil Agarwal

The board gave forth and Mohan doubled up.

Sushant meanwhile, was aggressively wielding his stack to bust players, eliminating Abhineet Jain at 19th, Amar Reddy at 17th and Pawan Jain at 16th place in quick succession. With this the Chennai pro took his lot to 579K.

Finally the money bubble burst on Nirav Parekh, who exited at 15th place. On his last hand of the tournament, Parekh moved all in for 56,000 with and Swaroop B reshoved with . The board with had no King or Jack for Parekh and Swaroop took down the pot.

Sushant went on to eliminate Neelabh Baranga at 11th place and then Mohan eliminated Rizwan S at 10th, to setup the nine-handed final table.

 

Final Table Recap

The final table began at 8pm, with Sushant having almost 30% of the chips in play.

Final Table Chip Counts

Sumit Asrani – 111,000
Vaibhav Sharma – 154,000
Mayank Agarwal – 167,000
Sangeeth Mohan – 227,000
Riyaz S – 225,000
Aditya Sushant – 825,000
Sumit Sapra – 234,000
Swaroop B – 245,000
Gaurav Jain – 315,000

Sumit Asrani, with the smallest stack exited almost immediately at ninth place. 30 minutes later, Mohan and Sushant moved in tandem to take out players in quick succession. Mohan eliminated Gaurav Jain at eighth place, with Sushant busting Sumit Sapra at seventh place a few minutes later.

Swaroop B was Mohan’s next victim, exiting at sixth place, while Sushant ousted Vaibhav Sharma at fifth place.

Swaroop B
Swaroop B
Vaibhav Sharma
Vaibhav Sharma

Four-handed play took an hour before Mayank Agarwal was railed at fourth place and a little while later Riyaz S was eliminated at third place by Mohan.

Mayank Agarwal
Mayank Agarwal
Riyaz S
Riyaz S

Heads up play saw Mohan with the advantage of 1,410,000 against Sushant’s 1,085,000. A deal was immediately agreed on with Mohan getting ₹12.5 Lakhs, Sushant taking ₹11.5 Lakhs, with an additional ₹1.60 Lakhs and the title for the winner.

The heads-up battle lasted 30 minutes and soon Mohan had doubled up, after which the final hand sealed the deal. Sushant bet 65,000 and Mohan raised it to 160,000. Sushant called and the flop came down . Mohan bet 180K and Sushant went all-in. Mohan responded with a call.

Sangeeth Mohan

Aditya Sushant

The turn and river opened and respectively and Mohan took down the title with his pocket aces. Sushant finished runner up for ₹11.50 Lakhs, while Mohan collected the trophy and the winning prize of ₹14.10 Lakhs

Congratulations to both the pros on their superb performance in the IPC 60K Highroller.

Aditya Sushant with Sangeeth Mohan
Aditya Sushant with Sangeeth Mohan

Final Table Results (₹)

1. Sangeeth Mohan – 14,10,000*

2. Aditya Sushant – 11,50,000*

3. Riyaz S – 7,34,000

4. Mayank Agarwal – 5,80,000

5. Vaibhav Sharma – 4,20,000

6. Swaroop B – 3,07,000

7. Sumit Sapra – 2,08,000

8. Gaurav Jain – 1,60,000

9. Sumit Asrani – 1,26,000

*denotes heads-up deal

The 30K Main Event will play down to champion today, so stay with us, as we bring you all the updates live from ground zero.

Nikunj Jhunjhunwala Makes History, Collects Back-To-Back Titles With IPC Dec Main Event Win, Sam Razavi Makes 3rd Place Finish

Nikunj Jhunjhunwala (cover image)was told by his friends that he could not win tournaments! He proved them wrong, not once, but twice over!

Amidst a thundering round of applause, Jhunjhunwala beamed, as he won the IPC December ₹50K Main Event for the top prize of ₹15.3 Lakhs, after a four-way deal. The win is a record-breaking one, coming as it does right after Jhunjhunwala won the first-ever IPC ₹100K Highroller just two days earlier, making him the only player to collect back-to-back titles at the most prestigious tournament series in the country.

I am speechless and elated, the feeling has not yet sunk in” declared the winner, after the long final table that included 3-time APT POY title winner Sam Razavi, among others.

Etching his name into the history books of Indian poker, Jhunjhunwala additionally gets the 2015 India Player of the Year (IPOY) title, with the points from these wins. The smiling Mumbai-based player gets iPhone 6S, Macbook Air and INR 2 Lakhs worth of IPC seats for the next season for this title. Displaying an immense attitude of sportsmanship, Jhunjhunwala immediately decided to share the last with bubble boy Abhisek Panda, stating that, “Abhisek Panda has worked very hard for 11 months to reach here and I feel he deserves it a lot more than I do, so I think its the right thing to do.

 

IPC 50K Main Event – Day 2

The event resumed at 3 pm with the 55 survivors from Day 1 of the event, led by Anuj Muchala, who had 252,000 in chips. Once again, there played out a slew of eliminations, with the eye on the money bus, which began with the 24th player. Harsh Jain, Anil Gulati, Zarvan Tumboli, Spartan Team Pro Sangeeth ‘Samoh’ Mohan, Gaurav Law, Siddharth Singhvi, Rajeev Raut and Jaideep Sajwan were all busted within the two hours of play.

Muchala could be seen improving his already large stack, while Spartan Team Mentor Rohit Bhalla was busy crushing opponents at his table.

 

Bubble Boy

By 5pm however, the chip lead had swung to Rohit Mariwala, with several others like Abhishek Panda doubling their stacks. Panda’s was a short victory, as less than 30 minutes later, his valiant fight was cut short, when he was busted by Arun Babbar.

The fatal hand saw Babbar open with 13,000 from Panda moved all-in for 45,000. Babbar called.

Arun Babbar

Abhisek Panda

Though things looked good for Panda, the board with gave Babbar a two pair and Panda was eliminated at 25th place, leaving the rest in the money.

Manoj Singh was the first to cash, as he exited at 24th place collecting INR 82,000 for his efforts.

Sam Razavi seemed to be having a great time at his table, where he was next to Jhunjhunala and the two were often to be found discussing the moves at the table. Both ended up again at the final table much later on.

Eliminations continued in the quest for the final table and among those was Rohit Bhalla’s, where a quirk of the board sent him to the rails at 15th place.

Zeeshan H

Rohit Bhalla

The flop of made both players a set but the King added extra weight to Zeeshan’s lot. The turn and river held up Zeeshan cards and Bhalla was out at 15th place.

At 9pm a final table was found, with Nariman Yaghmai leading the counts with a stack of 9,36,000.

Main Event Final Table
Main Event Final Table

Final Table Chip Counts

1. Rohit Mariwala – 5,84,000
2. Nariman Yaghmai – 9,36,000
3. Ujjwal Rana – 3,04,000
4. Sam Razavi – 7,26,000
5. Romit Advani – 2,12,000
6. Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – 3,50,000
7. Sahil Chutani – 3,32,000
8. Sonu Singh – 3,91,000
9. Zeshan H – 5,26,000

Smallest stack Romit Advani was the first final table elimination, exiting when Sahil Chutani’s pocket queens overpowered his pocket two’s on a board that read . Advani collected ₹1,90,000 for his ninth place finish.

Jhunjhunwala reached out to eliminate Ujwal Rana at eighth place and a little while later busted Sonu Singh at seventh place, giving him a strong lead at the table.

Sahil Chutani then busted Mariwalla at sixth place and was next himself, eliminated by Nariman Y at fifth place.

Four-handed play continued for almost an hour, when Razavi suggested a deal.

Chip Counts

Nariman Y – 1,385,000
Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – 1,210,000
Zeeshan H – 970,000
Sam Razavi – 730,000

While the others agreed, it took a little time for Nariman to understand, but finally a deal was struck to leave ₹ 3.3 Lakhs and the title for the winner, with the rest split up as follows:

Nariman Y – ₹12.5 Lakhs

Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – ₹12 Lakhs

Zeeshan H – ₹11 Lakhs

Sam Razavi – ₹10 Lakhs

Zeeshan H
Zeeshan H

It wasn’t long before Zeeshan hit the rails at fourth place, busted by Razavi, whose smile never left his face. But it was Jhunjhunwala’ patience and calm demeanor that proved stronger, as he continued to forge ahead relentlessly.

Soon, Razavi lost half his stack in a crippling blow by Nariman and in the next hand was eliminated by Jhunjhunwala.

Razavi had and moved all-in for 480,000. Jhunjhunwala called with . The board blanked out and Razavi was out at third place, paving the way for heads up play.

Sam Razavi
Sam Razavi

Heads-up Chip Counts

Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – 2,390,000
Nariman Y – 1,990,000

Heads up was a thrilling one and a half hour finale, where Nariman Y put up a credit-worthy fight and wrested the chip lead from Jhunjhunwala in 45 minutes.

Jhunjhunwala refused to be beaten and in the final 45 minutes he played an incredible game to not only take the lead, but clinch the title, relegating Nariman to second place.

The final hand of the tournament saw Nariman Y moving all-in from the button for 1,020,000 and Jhunjhunwala decided to call.

Nariman Y

Nikunj Jhunjhunwala

The last board of the tournament read out and Jhunjhunwala was the undisputed champion. Nariman was the runner-up and took home INR 12.5 Lakhs for a well-deserved battle.

Nariman Y and Nikunj Jhunjhunwala
Nariman Y and Nikunj Jhunjhunwala

Final Table Results (₹)

1. Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – 15,30,000*

2. Nariman Y – 12,50,000*

3. Sam Razavi – 10,00,000*

4. Zeeshan H – 11,00,000*

5. Sahil Chuthani – 5,10,000

6. Rohit Mariwalla – 4,00,000

7. Sonu Singh – 3,00,500

8. Ujwal Rana – 2,40,000

9. Romit Advani – 1,90,000

*Denotes four handed deal

Congratulations to Nikunj Jhunjhunwala for winning the IPC Dec Main Event!

Online Rankings

i Top Ranked Poker Players in India
Member Won
Member Won
Member Won
₹1,29,29,197
₹1,25,88,313
₹1,20,69,627
₹1,15,22,676
5.Vinay B Vinay B
₹1,14,52,995
6.M L M L
₹1,14,40,871
₹1,09,13,473
₹1,05,24,690
₹99,60,672
₹99,49,327
Member Profit
Member Profit
Member Profit
₹55,77,649
₹50,59,154
₹47,48,174
₹46,54,932
₹44,93,503
₹43,84,994
₹43,56,316
₹42,00,183
₹41,14,429
₹40,97,624
Member Points
Member Points
Member Points
42,268
35,945
28,827
4.N K N K
28,311
25,814
25,649
24,477
24,446
9.M L M L
23,604
22,922

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