These words by Sir Edmund Hillary ring true for our young achiever, whom we feature here. “As a young girl, I used to love trailing my mother into the forest in Salmora fetching fuel and fodder. The feel of fresh air and the solid ground beneath my feet made me feel at peace.” Narrates an excited 22-year-old Sheetal who has just claimed the coveted title of being: Youngest Woman Mountaineer in the World to summit Mount Kanchenjunga.
Her has been a journey of pure grit, determination and hard work from Salmora in Pithoragarh to Mount Kanchenjunga at 8586 mtrs above mean sea level.
An Art Graduate, Sheetal dropped a year in college to pursue her dreams. Her love for mountaineering began at the age of 18 as an NCC cadet at a Basic Mountaineering Course from Darjeeling. Since then the young lady has moved upwards and onwards.
“Actually mountaineering choose me,” she tells me. “Successfully climbing Rudragera peak in Uttarakashi, to Knock Peak in Sikkim, Dev-Tibba in Himanchal Pradesh, to Mount Trishul all in the year 2015, yet I failed to qualify for the Everest Expedition. I was very upset and disheartened but did not give up.”
The following year Sheetal signed up for an advance course in mountaineering from Pehalgaon in Jammu Kashmir and after completion of the course, she signed up as a member of the Indian Mountaineering Federation in Delhi. That she says was her turning point.
Hand picked by the ONGC for the Pre-Kanchenjunga Expedition Sheetal scaled Satopant Peak at 7075 mtrs. Being the best amongst many, she won the ONGC scholarship for the Kanchejunga Expedition and went through rigorous training in Manali and then in Ladakh in the month of January this year. “We were trained in minus 43 degrees temperature to test us in deep snow conditions, carrying fifteen to twenty kg and walking for ten to twelve hours a day.”
Post training, the All-Women Kanchenjunga Expedition set out with a team of 15 other members on the 4th of April 2018. Inclement weather tried to play spoil sport which left Sheetal disappointed as she felt this would be a repeat of the ‘Everest Expedition,’ she failed to qualify. But that wasn’t meant to be.
20th April, around 7:30 p.m. the weather gods smiled, and with a window of clear weather the team began their climb to the formidable peak, summiting it at 3:30 am on 21st of April.
The proud Deputy Leader of the expedition, Yogesh Garbiyal tells us, “Sheetal was exceptional but we were clueless that this young girl would be creating history. Though I had an inkling that she would be the First Youngest Indian Woman to claim this feat, but to confirm the same, I sent a satellite message from Camp Four to check the status from the Himalayan Data Base and on our return, we all were pleasantly surprised, by her being not the only Indian but the Youngest Woman Mountaineer in the World to scale Mt. Kanchenjunga.”
‘I had no idea that I would be setting a new world record, for me the thrill of being sponsored and making it to the summit was good enough, but this was a blessing in disguise,” an elated Sheetal shares with us.
At present the young lady is busy searching for Sponsors for her Everest Expedition, and the way this girl is motivated and determined, am sure she wont disappoint anyone.
