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New Delhi:
Fifty years in the past, three ladies from Kolkata – Sujaya Guha, Sudipta Sengupta and Kamala Saha – reached the summit of a 20,130-foot peak within the Lahaul area of Himachal Pradesh. This had by no means been climbed earlier than.
They named the height ‘Lalana’, which suggests ‘lady’ in Bengali.
On August 26, 1970, 5 days after they summited ‘Lalana’, Ms Guha and Ms Saha had been useless, swept away by the frigid, fast-flowing waters of a high-altitude stream fed by 5 glaciers. Another member of the crew, Shefali Chakraborty, was fortunate – she received caught on a boulder and managed to stroll away. Ms Guha’s physique was finally discovered however Kamala was misplaced endlessly.
Triumph had given approach to tragedy.
“It was a nightmarish experience,” says 74 year-old Sudipta Sengupta, the one surviving summiteer from the expedition. “We were all preparing to return home. We were headed to Batal to send the first telegram to let the world know that we had achieved this.” The crew had damaged into two. “We had hoped that the two would reach Batal. I was given the charge of joining them the next day after packing up the base camp,” says Ms Sengupta. “We were sitting outside in the dark, hoping for the mules to come. Suddenly one of the porters arrived and told us, ‘Leader didi mar gayi‘. He was breathless and said he couldn’t find the others. We were stunned.”
50 years later, nobody has managed to summit ‘Lalana’. The final try, in 2018, needed to be referred to as off. Multiple crevasses alongside the route, a prolonged route requiring rope-fixing and heavy shops meant that this try needed to be referred to as off with the climbers returning to the Base Camp.
“In 2018, an attempt was made,” says Ms Sengupta. “They couldn’t cross beyond 18,000 feet because of the crevasses. They said they wanted to come back to make another attempt.”
On August 5, 1970, the all-women expedition with six climbers and high-altitude porters set off from Manali the place they’d spent practically every week finding out their tools, rations and equipment. They crossed the Rohtang Pass, trekked as much as 10,800 toes to achieve Chhota Dara at 12,100 toes. After crossing the Chandra River, they arrange base camp at 12,700 toes, positioned Northeast of the Bara Shigri glacier.
Despite climate turning worse, the crew determined to maneuver on to their Advance Base Camps with the ultimate camp positioned at an altitude of 13,700 toes.
“Because of the poor weather and high winds, we found ourselves in a situation where boulders seemed to be falling all night.”
On Independence Day, 1970, the porters managed to hold up provides to Camp 1 at a peak of 16,100 toes following which the stage was set for the ultimate try, one that might see the climbers encounter close to vertical partitions of ice which they needed to traverse alongside a 70 diploma slope by chopping steps into the ice.
On August 18, as they set out from Camp 1 to ascertain Camp 2, the six climbers discovered the route forward of them criss-crossed with crevasses, the smaller ones coated with snow and intensely treacherous.
“If snow falls on the wider crevasses, it goes in and we can detect their presence. However, the small ones are always covered by layers of soft snow, particularly if the weather is bad. Sometimes, it is impossible to know where they are. These can be lethal.”
Setting up Camp 2 at a peak of 17,000 toes proved to be daunting. Finding no appropriate cease, the crew arrange the camp in between two giant crevasses, inside a hall which was barely sufficient for the width of a two-person tent. The website itself was on the fringe of a rock wall. “We pitched two tents facing each other and dared no emerge out of them without tying up ourselves,” wrote Ms Sengupta in her report of the expedition.
By August 19, it turned clear {that a} choice wanted to be taken. Determined to succeed regardless of the overwhelming odds, the crew got down to arrange Camp 3 at 18,000 toes by the aspect of a giant ice scarp.
August 19 was additionally Ms Sengupta’s second of reality – loss of life appeared a definite chance. “I broke into a snow-covered crevasse,” she wrote within the mountaineering journal, Himavanta. “Dangling on the rope I could guess rather than see the bottomless pit, dark and menacing, staring up at me.” But Ms Sengupta was fortunate. “Fortunately, my rucksack got stuck and I was pulled up by Sujayadi and Gyalchhen (one of the porters).”
On August 20, 1970, the ultimate camp website earlier than the assault on the height was struck by heavy winds. It began snowing closely. The climbers stayed of their tents getting set for his or her now or by no means second.
On August 21, tea and cashew nuts had been served at 2 am. “At 4 am, we left Camp 3 on two ropes for the final assault.”
The climb was arduous – nearly unimaginable at phases. “At 5:30 am, we were confronted with a steep ice face with exposed hard ice, which was also an avalanche point.” The climbers had been now at 18,373 toes, negotiating rocks and ice on a close to vertical rock-face.
Every step appeared an accomplishment within the rarified environment. “For the five years before 1970, I started to going to mountains. I was trained at the Himalayan Institute of Mountaineering in Darjeeling and the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering in Uttarkashi. Every year, we were going above 18,000 feet but we were acclimatised but definitely we had problems.”
The climate, luckily, was good – neither too sunny nor very cloudy.
With barely 500 toes left for the summit, catastrophe nearly struck, as soon as once more. The climbers had used up all 5 lengths of fastened rope with them. Would this imply the tip of the expedition, with victory seeming effectively inside attain?
“We had five ropes. Each one was 200 feet long. The path was so steep and the route was so bad, that we couldn’t go without fixed rope. We had to eventually depend on the rope that was connected to the three of us for support. And we somehow kept progressing.”
Finally, at 10:30 am on August 21, 1970, the 3 summiteers together with three Sherpas made it to the highest.
“It was out of the world. From the top, you could see 360 degrees. It was beautiful. We could see all the glaciers coming down as frozen rivers, blue skies,” says Ms Sengupta. “It is a pity I have no colour pictures. We sat there for one-and-a-half hours. We just looked at everything, stunned as we were and taking in everything around us.”
After 90 momentous minutes on the summit of the height that they’d named, it was time to get again – the journey down could be as powerful because the climb to the highest.
“On 22 August, Sujayadi sank into a crevasse while on her way to Camp 2.” Fortunately she was connected by a rope and was promptly rescued. Little did any members of the expedition think about, for a second, that Ms Guha could be useless only a day later.
Just seven miles from their base camp on August 23, the crew members who had been to proceed to Batal after splitting up had a option to make – would they threat crossing a high-altitude rivulet. The two porters had managed with nice problem. Ms Guha, the crew chief, determined to go forward, main from the entrance.
“Hand-in-hand, they stepped into the water, Sujayadi leading as usual, Kamala behind her and Shefali at the end.”
Then catastrophe struck.
“The only ice-axe which Shefali was carrying slipped from her hands. She herself slipped immediately thereafter and was carried away by the swirling waters.” Ms Chakraborty recovered, discovering herself caught between boulders near the financial institution about 50 toes from the place she had slipped. She pulled herself out of the water, looking out desperately for the opposite two ladies.
They had been nowhere to be discovered.
The high-altitude porters, who had crossed, noticed a windproof jacket on the floor of the water. They rushed to the spot the place, tragically, they discovered the physique of Sujaya Guha, the team-leader.
The remainder of the crew was nonetheless on the base camp and phrase of the catastrophe reached them within the night.
Five porters searched all night time. Kamala Saha was misplaced, her physique by no means recovered.
Sujaya Guha was cremated in her beloved mountains at Stindri, about three kilometres past Keylang. Her autopsy report mentioned she died of rapid heart-failure, presumably because of the shock of falling into the frigid waters.
Asked how she determined to change into a mountaineer greater than 50 years again, Ms Sengupta says, “Those days, we never heard of rock-climbing.” The uncle of a pal headed the Himalayan affiliation and the primary rock-climbing programs began in Purulia.”
Ms Sengupta, the deputy chief of the expedition, is the one surviving summiteer. She finally turned a structural geologist and was among the many first two ladies scientists to affix the third Indian Antarctic Expedition in 1983. Her Bengali e book ‘Antarctic’ stays a bestseller.
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