On 21st August 2012, an expedition consisting of nine men from the Indian Army and two civilians ploughed their way through a blizzard and four feet of snow to the advanced base camp of the mysterious Mt Zambala, in the Siachen Glacier. They were in the highest battlefield in the world. The Indian death toll in Siachen has been more than 900 so far. But 90% of those lives were claimed by the elements of nature rather than by combat. Mt Zambala rose above the glacier to a height of 5,850m, straddling Pakistan on one side, and India on the other. It was day 17 when the team finally arrived at the camp. They watched the snow-clad peaks around them with shifty eyes as they ate a meager meal of stale rotis and pickle. These mountains were treacherous. The strong sun would melt the big blocks of snow from the top. When they fell, they brought loose boulders with them, and they could crush the men while they were asleep. However, their lead climber, a dark lithe man from the South of India, remained calm and in control.
The total elevation of Mt Zambala is 19193 ft out of which 4600ft is sheer rock face which required Alpinist-style climbing
Praveen CM had always loved climbing. Ever since he was a little boy. After all, it was the most natural instinct that a man could have considering we had evolved from apes. He has been something of an icon in the climbing community in India. Fifteen years of winning climbing championships and various climbing records have made sure of that. However, he had to choose between the world championship in France and Mt Zambala that year. His grandfather had passed away a month ago. He wondered what his grandfather's advice might have been. Praveen was violently ill throughout his journey to the mountains. The choice was made. There was no backing out now.
Back at the camp, the army men had begun their ascent of the mountain. The granite had a thin layer of frosted ice on it. The unforgiving weather didn’t make it any easier to climb either. Each crimp on the rock had ice stuck on it, making it impossible to hold on to. Praveen was leading the climb, bolting anchors and cleaning each hold with an ice axe. Each pitch he bolted was 40m long. The men tried to keep up, climbing hard, making do with the two hours of sun they got every day. But it wasn’t long before they gave in to fear. Nine out of the eleven members of the expedition team decided to stay put at the advanced base camp. Praveen was now left with a belayer, Arun Baby, a thin reedy young man from the Army, to attempt the summit of Mt. Zambala.
Arun Baby, Praveen's partner in the expedition pauses for a moment before he jumars up into a section which Praveen would later describe as the 'heart of the mountain'.
It may have been almost a month since anyone from his family had contacted Praveen. He seldom mentioned the details of his adventures to his family, lest they should worry. They were not too encouraging of his climbing career. A safe, well-paying desk job was any day more desirable than risking one's life to climb rocks and mountains, they never failed to remind him. All they wanted was for him to get married and have an ordinary life, to give up climbing. Marry, he did. Only, it did not last very long. The divorce left him in a wreck. He was already in his late twenties. For an athlete in India, 28 years is old. He almost gave up climbing in his desperation. But then, like a true sportsman, he bounced back with dignity and slowly started to train himself for higher, new and ambitious goals.
The total vertical climb from the advanced base camp to the peak was a little more than 4,600ft. The army had provided him with equipment. Every item provided by them had to be returned, accounted for – making him wary of using pitons as hangers. At the beginning of the climb, Praveen was bolting anchors at 1m intervals throughout the 40m pitch. But the battery of his drill machine didn’t even reach half the advertised battery life at -25 to -35 degree C. He didn’t have a solar charger either. That meant, every time the battery died, it had to be sent down to the advanced base camp to be recharged for six hours (and the generator used for recharging took another six hours to charge itself). The weather, unfortunately, wasn’t getting any better. Therefore, to save all those trips up and down the mountain, Praveen decided to take the fast lane to the top. He started bolting at 40m intervals.
Mist slowly creeps onto the Siachen Glacier which has claimed more than 900 Indian lives till date.
Praveen had never shied away from danger. In 2015, when five boys fell into a 150ft gap in the rocks while trekking in Savanadurga (a 3,000ft monolith near Bangalore), Praveen was the best bet for rescue after the police and the fire department had failed. It was hard, that climb. Not so much because he was risking his life, but because there were five lives at stake. Even as he free soloed certain portions of the climb, there was never a question of failure. He simply could not afford to fail. For men who don't have an option to turn back, there is only one way ahead. When he reached the boys, they were weak from 12 hours of exposure to the sun and dehydration. But they survived and they only had this young rock climber to thank for it.
Often, Praveen had thought he would not survive Zambala. How could he conquer a mountain in a terrain where the hardiest army men could barely survive in the best of conditions? The rocks had gnawed into his fingers, eating away at his flesh, tendons made visible. The sub-zero temperatures numbed the pain. His mouth was parched from blowing into the holes after drilling. He had eaten a lot of the granite dust. He was sure the mountain would retaliate.
Often, Praveen had thought he would not survive Zambala.
Praveen had sensed a certain hostility towards him in the climbing community. All his contemporaries had given up competitive climbing. Most of them were married with children and sported potbellies, a mark of their prosperity. They were nostalgic about their glorious climbing days and regarded Praveen with something akin to envy. When an elderly member of the Indian Mountaineering Foundation came up to tell him that it was about time he quit, Praveen thought that he was, in more ways than one, the last man standing.
They had to anchor themselves to the wall and make do with a 2 ft wide ledge and a tarpaulin to protect them from the snow.
Standing alone at about 3,300ft above the advanced base camp, Praveen had reached something that looked like a crystal cove. Mist shrouded the belayer somewhere below. The duo hadn't had much sleep the last few nights. They didn’t have hammocks or hanging tents to camp on the wall. They had to anchor themselves to the wall and make do with a 2 ft wide ledge and a tarpaulin to protect them from the snow. Perhaps it was the exhaustion and the lack of sleep, but Praveen felt like he had reached the heart of Mt Zambala. It was a beautiful, sacred place.
If there are to be great world class climbers from India, they would have to come from rural India. Praveen always believed that. He had been training Army men and conducting various climbing camps for years. But now he felt that wasn't enough. Rural climbers needed an opportunity to train on their own turf, so they can be ready when the competitions are due. With this end in view, Praveen decided to start bolting routes in areas where local climbers could benefit from. With no sponsors or funds, limited equipment, a broken, borrowed drill machine and several starry-eyed local climbing students, Praveen started his journey, towards the end of 2015, in Badami, which he believes is the heart of Indian climbing.
The rain and snow made the climb harder on the slippery granite surface.
The last ten pitches of Zambala were the most difficult ones. The weather had taken a turn for the worse. The snow fell hard on his face and the warm granite was melting the snow on top, resulting in waterfalls that came gushing towards him. Visibility was, by now, less than four feet. Praveen felt exhausted beyond what he thought was humanly possible to endure. The weather was ruthless. He had come to the crux, the most difficult part of the climb. He picked up the walkie-talkie and gave his belayer strict instructions to call for rescue and save himself in case Praveen took a fall. He knew it would be futile to try and save him. His partner had asked him to come back, he was terrified. Praveen knew that he wouldn't come back to this mountain again. He would have to make it to the summit. Or die trying.
The weather took a turn for the worst and a few minutes after this shot was taken, visibility had plunged to less than 4ft.
The last pitch was the most trying. The battery went dead with the bolt driven half way into the wall. Praveen was now left with a dead drill machine, water soaked climbing shoes, a carabiner and a piton to save his life. Would he live to tell the tale? Foolhardy as he was, he left the drill machine at the half-bolt, reminded his belayer of his instructions once again and moved on towards the last pitch of Zambala, free climbing (with only the half-bolt to catch his fall) using the piton in one hand like an ice axe and his bare hands to claw on the ice.
Praveen's last sight of his partner, before he gave it all to make the all too dangerous summit of Mt. Zambala
On 28 September 2012, Praveen became the first and only man to have summited Mt Zambala (5850m). Praveen wasn't much of a believer in miracles until that spring of 2012. For it had to be a miracle, for a 27 year old climber from Bangalore with no previous mountaineering experience and limited equipment to summit a peak in Siachen.
Praveen and I are watching his students climb up a red rock in Badami, with the sun setting in the background. These days, he ponders whether securing their future would be a greater struggle than climbing Zambala. But after summiting, how did you climb down the peak, I ask him. The weather had been too bad for a helicopter evacuation. He smiles and says, "But that’s a story for another day."
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(Story as narrated by Praveen C M to Jyothy Karat)
Photographs courtesy Praveen C M
This story was originally published in the March 2016 issue of Adventure Magazine.
