Woman mountaineer from Bengal climbs Mt Everest

Kolkata: Woman mountaineer Chanda Gayen has successfully scaled the Mt Everest on Saturday, becoming the third woman from West Bengal to achieve the feat.

A message from the base camp at Solo Khumbu in Nepal reaching here said Chanda, who started the last part of her journey for the summit from camp four at South Col on Friday night, followed the South East ridge route and reached the top at 7 AM. Chanda, a resident of Howrah in her mid 30s, is the third woman from the state to climb the 8,848 mt peak. Earlier, Kunga Bhutia from Darjeeling in 1994 and Maj (retired) Shipra Majumdar from Murshidabad in 2004 gained success. Chanda began her climbing career through city-based mountaineering club, Institute of Exploration, and was trained from the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling. She had climbed Jogin I and III in Garhwal Himalaya in 2008 and Manirang in Himachal Pradesh in 2012. In her present venture, Chanda left Kolkata on March 28 and reached the base camp at Solo Khumbu after trekking for seven days via Namche Bazar and Thayangboche on April 8. It has been learnt that a number of climbers, both men and women, from various Indian states, are now at higher camps and waiting for favourable weather to attempt reaching the summit soon. PTI