The last DPT for 2019 that ran from 31st July to 5th August at the Deltin Royale in Goa turned out to be huge success. As expected, the popular poker festival attracted a good mix of pros and new faces from across the country to provide them arena for quality action and the chance to win life-changing prizes. It distributed close to INR 3 Cores in prizes to 1000 + players who flocked to the host venue to celebrate their favorite game and enter the exciting poker tournaments featured on the schedule.
Rishabh Vekaria, who is primarily a cash game player, was indisputably the festival’s biggest winner. The player took down the INR 35K Main Event on 5th August to collect the first-place prize of INR 30 Lac, his first live tournament cash. The second biggest winner to emerge at the series was none other than the veteran Nikujn Jhunjhunwala who won the Adda52 65K High Roller for INR 27, 50,000.
To celebrate the end of the super successful last edition of the DPT for 2019, we looked through its 4 major tournaments to spot the poker players who won big at the series. Here they are:
Rishabh Vekaria – DPT 35K Main Event Champion
Primarily a cash game player, Rishabh Vekaria emerged as the biggest winner at the series. The player outlasted the second largest field of the DPT 35K Main Event to collect a hefty INR 30 Lac. The Main Event was the INR 35K buy-in one and drew 448 entries, easily surpassing its 1 Crore guarantee and generating a total prize pool of INR 1. 56 Crores, which was shared by the top 56 finishers with a min-cash of INR 58,700. This win was first live tournament cash for Vekaria who beat Ankur Sehgal in heads-up to win the title. Sehgal earned INR 21 Lac to emerge the 3rd biggest earner of the series.
The well-known pro Anup Palod was also in race for the title but he exited in 3rd place and earned INR 13,80,000, which happens to be the 5th biggest prize awarded to a player at this DPT series.
Final Table Payouts (INR):
1. Rishabh Vekaria – INR 30,00,000
2. Ankur Sehgal – INR 21,00,000
3. Anup Palod – INR 13,80,000
4. Tarun Goyal – INR 9,30,000
5. Amit Tejura – INR 7,10,000
6. Samit Mehta – INR 5,80,000
7. Paawan Bansal – INR 5,00,000
8. Siddarth Singhvi – INR 4,00,000
9. Anmol Chawla – INR 3,00,000
Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – Adda52 65K High Roller Champion
A high stakes cash game specialist, Nikunj Jhunjhunwala needs no introduction. He is known for his fineness in deep-structured tournaments. Just a few days back, he emerged victorious in the Adda52 65K High Roller Event for INR 27,50,000, the second biggest prize won by a player at the recently-concluded DPT series. To claim his win, Nikunj bested a field of 146 entries, almost double the 86 entries registered in the last High Roller in February this year. He reached heads-up with the lawyer-turned poker pro Ashish Ahuja who played well but could not go all the way, eventually finishing 2nd for INR 16,90,000, the 4th biggest prize scooped by a player at the recently-concluded DPT. Ninkunj has been making big headlines in tournament poker and has already won several big titles, including the two IPC titles, one WPT title and now he has added a DPT title to his resume.
Final Table Payouts (INR):
1.Nikunj Jhunjhunwala – INR 27,50,000
2.Ashish Ahuja – INR 16,90,000
3.Ronak Vyas – INR 10,10,000
4.Shawn Chatterton – INR 6,60,000
5.Goonjan Mall – INR 5,10,000
6.Ashish Kaushik – INR 4,20,000
7. Prashob P.J – INR 3,55,000
Pranay Mungekar – 15K Deep Dive Champion
The 15K Deep Dive was the opening event of the series and it turned out to be a grand success attracting 294 entries. The biggest earner to emerge in this event was Pranay Mungekar who won it for INR 10 Lac, the 6th biggest live cash at the series. It was the first live tournament win for Pranay after a furious heads-up with Mitang Soni who eventually settled for INR 6,90,000 for his deep run.
Final Table Payouts (INR):
1. Pranay Mungekar – INR 10,00,000
2. Mitang Soni – INR 6,90,000
3. Samit Mehta – INR 4,30,000
4. Neeraj Pahuja – INR 2,60,000
5. Anand Babu – INR 2,00,000
6. Shivam Shukla – INR 1,67,000
7. Akshay Ghori – INR 1,42,000
8. Abhishek Sharma – INR 1,20,000
9. Chirag Agarwal – INR 1,00,000
Pankaj Bhardwaj – DPT 15K Bounty Winner
The last DPT edition for 2019 also featured a 15K NLH Bounty event to cater to bounty lovers. The event saw a total of 167 entries and found a winner in a relatively less known Pankaj Bhardwaj who beat Samsher Gandhi in HU to earn INR 2,05,000. He played some top notch poker and accumulated as many as 17 bounty bands. Here are the payouts for the final table finishers of the event:
1. Pankaj Bhardwaj – INR 2,05,000
2. Samsher Gandhi – INR 1,30,000
3. Jayjit Ray – INR 77,000
4. Jasdeep Nagpal – INR 45,000
5. Dairo Soto Mendez – INR 35,000
6. Amit Kumar – INR 30,000
7. Abhinandan Sarda – INR 25,000
8. Achal R Sonale – INR 23,000
9. Abhishek Chinya – INR 20,220
The next big event to be hosted at the Deltin Royale will be WPT India, which runs from 15-21 October. The WPT India has been highly successful with impressive turnouts across its last two seasons. Last year, the series saw 697 entries for the Main Event and this upcoming edition should be bigger in terms of turnouts as a lot of new faces in India have taken up poker over the last one year.
