Himachal bus driver’s daughter is first Indian woman to scale four 8,000-m peaks in a month

“Meri beti ne jo kar dikhaya hai, woh toh hamare liye sabse uncha kam hai (Our daughter’s feat is the highest honour for us),” said Shanti Devi while speaking with The Indian Express from her village Panjrol in Kandhaghat tehsil of Himachal’s Solan district.

The news, however, didn’t come entirely as a surprise for Shanti Devi, who saw in the feat a culmination of her daughter’s childhood dreams. “She was always fascinated by mountains. As a child, she would climb the small hills near our village,” recalled Shanti Devi.

Baljeet (right) at the top of Mt. Lhotse. Mt. Everest can be seen in the background.

As a young child, Baljeet, along with her three siblings, would often help Shanti Devi in managing the farm work. With her father Amrik Singh working as a bus driver with Himachal Road Transport Corporation, Baljeet would help her mother apart from pursuing studies in the Government Senior Secondary School at Mamligh, aneighbouring village.

It was at the school that she enrolled herself with the National Cadet Corps (NCC). During an NCC camp, Baljeet had her first tryst with mountaineering. At the age of 20, she was selected for a NCC expedition to Mt Deo Tibba followed by a team of 10 NCC mountaineers for an expedition to the 7,120[m high Mt Trishul. The team reached a height of 6,350m before the climb had to be curtailed due to bad weather in 2015. A year later, Naljeet was once again part of NCC expedition to Mt Everest, a climb where the team reached 8,548m before the ascent was called off. The last one year has seen Baljeet summiting the 7,161-m high Mt Pumori near the Nepal-Tibet border becoming the one of the first Indian woman mountaineers along with Gunbala Sharma of Rajasthan to achieve the feat. She later became the first Indian female mountaineer to successfully climb the 8,167-m high Mt Dhaulagiri.

On Sunday, she became the only Indian woman mountaineer to scale four 8,000-m peaks, including Mt Everest (May 22), Mt Annapurna (8,091m; April 28), Mt Kanchenjunga (8,586m; May 12) and Mt Lhotse (May 23) in one season. She also matched the record of Pune mountaineer Priyanka Mohite of climbing five 8,000-m mountains.

“As a young child, Baljeet would often accompany me to our farmland. Her father worked as a bus driver in Himachal Road Transport Corporation and Baljeet would often ask him about places he would go to. To see her achieve this feat feels special…we hope it will inspire girls all over India to dream big,” said Shanti Devi.

“Sometimes, during her expeditions, she would tell me about bad weather or blizzards but I would always tell her to believe in god. While NCC supported her early expeditions, we had to struggle to support her other expeditions as my husband retired years ago. In 2019, when she planned to scale Mt Trishul, I had to sell some of the gold ornaments to support her. She ran a crowd funding campaign to support her dream,” recalled Shanti Devi.

On Monday, Baljeet was going to base camp at Dingboche in a helicopter before she spoke with The Indian Express. “It’s a huge honour for me to have successfully climbed four 8000-m mountains, including Mt Everest, in one season. I am thankful to god that I could achieve the feat. It all started from a NCC camp for me at the GMSSS, Mamligh and if I can achieve this feat, any girl in the world could aspire to achieve such a feat,” said Baljeet Kaur.

The Himachal woman summited Mt Lhotse with Mingma Sherpa. She will be back in Kathmandu later this week before flying back to India. Mother Shanti Devi has already started preparations for her daughter’s homecoming. “Sometimes, villagers would tell us that Baljeet’s face has been spoiled by sun burn but climbing has been her passion. As a part for the NCC team, she once met then President Pranav Mukherjee and would share her picture with all her friends. On her return, she will be meeting all the village children at the school to tell them about her feat,” shared Shanti Devi.