Trekking
Top Climbing Feats Of The Indian Mountaineering
From the truly heroic successes at Kanchenjunga and Everest to first ascents in the Ladakh and Garhwal mountains, Indian mountaineers have been all over the top mountains.
2018 was yet another remarkable year for the Indian mountaineering. If last year Anshu Jamsenpa had hit the global headlines and earned herself a place in the hall of fame of the international climbing world after becoming the first woman to summit the Mount Everest twice in five days, then this year was also equally good, if not better.
In 2018 also, new records were made, unconquered peaks were scaled for the first time, and many promising climbers made a debut.
Here is a quick round-up of the top high points of the Indian mountaineering in 2018 with a wish that the year 2019 will turn out to be even better.
1. Sheetal Raj: Youngest woman in the world to summit Kanchenjunga
Sheetal Raj, who belongs to Pithoragarh in Uttarakhand, climbed Kanchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world, at the age of 22, making her the youngest woman to do so. Sheetal reached the summit on May 21.
2. Arjun Vajpai: Youngest man in the world to scale six eight-thousanders
The poster boy of Indian mountaineering, Arjun Vajpai became the youngest climber to scale fourteen of the six eight-thousanders when he summitted Kanchenjunga, on May 20, 2018, at the age of 24. The other five mountains above 8000 meters Arjun has already climbed are: Everest, Manaslu, Lhotse, Makalu and Cho Oyu.
3. Tribal teenagers on the top of the world
It was truly heroic when five tribal students — Manisha, Umakant Madavi, Parmesh Aale, Vikas Soyam and Kavidas Katmode — from the rural district of Chandrapur in Maharashtra reached the top of the Mount Everest and hoisted the Indian flag on the early morning of May 16, 2018. The five teenagers were part of the ten-member team that had attempted the Everest before undergoing a year of rigorous training.
4. Shivangi Pathak: Second youngest Indian girl to climb Everest
Shivangi became the second youngest India girl to summit the Mount Everest from the Nepal side in May, 2018. Shivangi, who is from Hisar in Haryana, achieved the feat at the age of 16. Malavath Purna is the youngest Indian and also the youngest girl in the world to reach the Everest summit. Malavath had scaled Everest from the more difficult Tibetan side at the age of 13 years and 11 months on May 25, 2014. Prior to that Dicky Dolma had held the record of being the youngest girl to climb Everest at the age of 19 in 1993.
5. Sangeeta Sindhi Bahl: The oldest Indian woman to climb Everest
A former Miss India finalist, Sangeeta became the oldest Indian woman to climb Mount Everest at the age of 53. Sangeeta, who is from Jammu and Kashmir, climbed the highest mountain in the world in her second attempt. Before Sangeeta, Premlata Agarwal was the oldest Indian woman to have scaled the Everest at the age of 48.
6. Love Raj Singh Dharamshaktu climbs Everest, 7th time
Dharmshaktu, an Assistant Commandant with the Border Security Force (BSF), set a new record by climbing the Everest a record 7th time. He achieved the feat on May 20, 2018. A Padma Shree awardee, Dharamshaktu hails from Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand. Prior to 2018, Dharamshaktu had climbed Everest in 1998, 2006, 2009, 2012, 2013 and 2017.
7. First Ascent of Janhukot Peak
British mountaineers Malcolm Bass, Paul Figg and Guy Buckingham became the first mountaineers to successfully climb Janhukot, a 6805-meter tall mountain at the end of the Gangotri glacier in the Garhwal Himalaya. The British climbers reached the Janhukot peak on June 6, 2018. Several attempts had been made by climbers from India, Europe, New Zealand and America but Janhukot remained unclimbed till the British expedition finally succeeded.
8. HMI Team Creates Record At Mount Kang Yatse 1 and 2
In a first, a three-member team from the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute (HMI), Darjeeling, successfully traversed between the peaks of Mount Kang Yatse 1 (6401 meters) and Mount Kang Yatse 2 (6250 meters) in Ladakh on August 17, 2018. Many attempts had been made to traverse between these two peaks by various teams but all of them had failed. The 3-member team of Pawel Sharma, Passang Tenzing and Girish Singh traversed 1.7 kms between the two peaks in around 6 hours in extremely difficult conditions. There were two teams of nine members each of HMI that climbed Kang Yatse 1 and 2 but only three members traversed the peaks.
9. Uttarakhand High Court bans overnight stay in the meadows
And finally, the order that shook the trekking world. Uttarakhand High Court order on August 23, 2018, banned the overnight stay in the bugyal (meadows) and asked the state government to restrict the number of people visiting the meadows to 200 at a given time. While the tourism and trekking agencies received the news with shock, the order was hailed by the environmentalists, terming it as a turning point in the struggle to save the pristine forests.
