CORRESPONDENCE

23 December 1989.
4 October 1989
18 January 1990
6 February 1990

The Indian Mountaineering Foundation,
Benito Juarez Road,
New Delhi 110021.
23 December 1989.

To, Mr. K. N. Naoroji.
President,
The Himalayan Club.

Dear Mr. Naoroji,

We learn with deep distress the sad passing away of two stalwarts of Himalayan Club, R. E. Hawkins and Soli S. Mehta, in a short span of three weeks.

In your Obituary Note dated 19 November 1989, it has been mentioned that Soli Mehta's collaboration with Jagdish Nanavati to correct the wrong claims about Nilkanth and Sudarshan Parbat 'were monumental struggles where for sake of correct records he took great pains and stood against all odds. His recent questioning of alleged ascent of Kabru Dome was fearless as much as principled.'*

* See, the Himalayan Club Newsletter 43, p. 5. Also refer to the obituary on Soli Mehta in the present issue. — Ed

I may mention, that the expedition to peak Nilkanth was leti by Major N. Kumar (now Colonel) in 1961. The team members were A. K. Chowdhury, Mulk Raj, R. C, Roy, O. P. Sharma, A. J. S. Grewal and Phurba Lobsang and Lhakpa Lama.

The summit of Nilkanth was reached by O. P. Sharma, Phurba Lobsang and Lhakpa GialBu Lama on 13 June 1961, but doubts were expressed about the summit party having reached the summit.

A committee under Brig. Gyan Singh and an expert from the Survey of India, was appointed by the Indian Mountaineering foundation to examine the account of the expedition. The committee examined the account of the expedition and was satisfied that the peak had indeed been climbed. An aeroplane sortie was also arranged by the I.M.F. from which photographs of mountains were taken, but it did not resolve the matter and doubts continued to be expressed about the claim of the Nilkanth climb.

To place the matter beyond arty doubt, a second committee under Chairmanship of Col B. S. Jaswal, then the Principal of the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, Lt Col M. M. Dutta, an expert from the Survey of India, and Major John Dias (leader of the 1962 Everest expedition) as members, was appointed, to conduct a thorough enquiry and examine every aspect of the claim. The committee in its seven-day deliberations, examined all the available records of the expedition, paying special attention to the comments of Jagdish Nanavati of the Himalayan Club, and interviewed O. P. Sharma and Sherpa Lhakpa Gyalbu Lama — two of the three who had reached the summit of Nilkanth. The committee also stated that the 'stereoscopic examination of vertical aerial photographs in high magnification precision stereoplotting instruments' revealed three distinctive features which are significant, namely, the stone boulders on the southern face where the second summit party rested after crossing the same ridge, some rock features between the second and third hump and lastly the crescent shape of the summit with a depression dfscribed as U-shaped. None of these features could have been described without their having been reached; in particular it was clear to the committee that the peak could not have been described as U-shaped unless the summit party had scaled the peak. The committee accordingly came to the conclusion tha 'Shri O. P. Sharma and the two Sherpas, Phurba Lobsang and Lhakpa Giyalbu Lama had climbed the summit, i.e., the highest point of the Nilkanth Peak in June 1961'.

We in the Indian Mountaineering Foundation were fully satisfied about the climb of Nilkanth in 1961 and accepted the claim.

The claim refuted by the Himalayan Club in respect of Gangotri Expedition Committee's expedition to Sudarshan Parbat in 1972, was also investigated by the I.M.F. and finally it was found that the Himalayan Club's view was correct and the claim was not accepted.

Major Cherian's claim of Kabru Dome in 1987 as suggested by the Himalayan Club, was also not accepted by the Indian Mountaineering Foundation.

I shall appreciate if the Himalayan Club will correct their records in respect of the Nilkanth climb, which was settled satisfactorily. If this is not done, it is requested that this letter should be printed in the Himalayan Journal.

H. C. SARIN
President (Emeritus)
Indian Mountaineering Foundation

Note : The wish to set the records straight about the 1961 Nilkanth episode is appreciated. However, the claim of ascent was disproved by the objective studies which are available. (See H.J. Vol. 41, p. 122, Vol. 45, p. 80 and Exploring the Hidden Himalaya, p. 64. All the relevant references, sequence of events and conclusions are mentioned in these.) The data and the studies of the committee on Nilkanth were never made available to anyone interested.

The details about the claims of ascents of Sudarshan Parbat and Kabru Dome were studied by the Himalayan Club and the conclusions were available for all to see. The leaders of these teams, on presenting these studies and facts, themselves withdrew the claims of ascents, which were noted and accepted by all.

Only upon studying the data of the committees mentioned above, the matter can be academically studied and fresh conclusions reached. A little glasnost'm the matter after almost three decades would be welcome.—Ed.

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University of Bristol,
Department of Geography,
University Road,
Bristol BS8 1SS,
ENGLAND.
4 October, 1989

The Editor,
Himalayan Journal.

Re: 'Oldi Comes Alive' (Major A. M. Sethi, H.J. Vol. 45, Pp. 109-113)

Dear Sir,

The F. A. Peter listed on the Visser 1935 Karakoram expedition memorial stone was a Moravian missionary based in Ladakh and Lahul during 1930-1940. Like others of his colleagues such as Karl Marx (NOT the world famous one) and A. H. Francke, he was an enthusiastic recorder of local information and one of his last papers to be published was 'Glossary of place names in Western Tibet' (Tibet Journal 2(2), 5-37, 1976) He retired to Zurich and died some years ago but is survived by his sister Elizabeth Peter who accompanied him in Ladakh and still lives in Switzerland.

May I take this opportunity of drawing to the attention of your readers the International Association for Ladakh Studies (IALS). Four International Colloquia have been held at two-year intervals in East and West Germany, France and England, covering topics ranging from Archaeology to Zoology, and from Buddhism to Health. The proceedings of two have been published* and two are still in press. The next Colloquium is planned for September 1991 in Ladakh; anyone interested in membership of the Association should write to me.

Yours sincerely,
Henry Osmaston
(Hon. Sec. IALS)

* D. KANTOWSKI & R. SANDER (eds.) 1983. Recent Research on Ladakh : history, culture, sociology, ecology, Weltforum verlag, Munich.

* C. DENDALETCHE (ed) 1985. Ladakh, Himalaya Occidental: ethnologie, ecologie. Recent Research No. 2 Acta Biologica montana 5 Pau.

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63E Mahanirban Road,
Calcutta 700029,
18 January 1990

To,
The Editor,
Himalayan Journal.

Dear Mr. Kapadja,

Thanks for your letter of 10 January and for the good wishes, which I heartily reciprocate.

In the Himalayan Journal, Vol. 45 (p. 57, lines 15/16) you have written 'Shipton in 1936 had descended from Satopanth glacier and had an anxious time in these thick woods infested with bears.' By these 'thick woods' you mean the jungles along the pilgrim route of Badri Narayan, Rudranath and Tungnath. But in August, 1934 (not 1936), Eric Shipton and H. W. Tilman accompanied by three Sherpas made an attempt to reach Kedarnath from Badrinath. They traversed from Satopanth glacier and forced a passage through a col (5608 m). Negotiating a series of icefalls, they could arrive at Gondar village, below Madmaheswar with great difficulty. (H.J. Vol. V, pg. 1-26 reprinted in H.J. Vol. XXXV, pg. 84-90 summarised in Himavanta January 1985 pg 132 -133). So their route was much to the west of the pilgrim route.

With regards,
Sincerely,
Kamal K. Guha

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R. S. MOWLL,
24, Millway,
Rickmansworth.
Herts,
WD32QP
U.K.
6 February 1990

To,
The Editor,
Himalayan Journal.

Dear Sir,

Recent warnings in our journal of the deterioration of the ecology of the Himalaya should concern us all. As has been pointed out, one of the major problems is soil erosion due to deforestation.

Not widely known outside Nepal, incidentally one of the poorest countries in the world, is the current policy of the Indian Government in restricting imports to that land locked country.

One of the effects of this policy has been to greatly reduce the impor of kerosene, widely used as fuel in rural areas, inevitably leading to the increased use of wood, more deforestation and more soil erosion in Nepal.

It has recently been said that most members of the Himalayan Club now live in India, possibly the largest democracy in the world, so I take this opportunity to encourage fellow members to get this situation put right.

Yours sincerely,
Ron Mowll

P.S. : May I say how much I enjoy the Himalayan Journal. It may well be that by the time you consider this letter for publication, the situation will have been put right already — I leave it to your discretion.

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