In view of the 175th anniversary of IIT Roorkee and celebration of the 51st year of Himalayan Explorer Club (HEC), HEC organized a webinar on Incredible Himalayas, a trek to Kedartal with an alumni group, Friendship peak expedition and Pin Parvati Pass Trek.
Incredible Himalayas Webinar
Celebrating 175 years of IIT Roorkee and Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav, HEC IIT Roorkee had organized a virtual event from 7th-9th Nov, 2021 with some of the esteemed personalities who are celebrated mountaineers and have a lot to share about their experiences and adventures in exploring the Himalayas.
The speakers were:
Gautam Dutta - celebrated Mountaineer, who was the first Indian to attempt Mt. Everest via the most dreaded great Couloir Route on the North face and covered all the difficult portions of the climb without Sherpa support in 1991 (along with 3 other companions).
Wg Cdr Amit Chowdhury, VSM (Retd) - celebrated mountaineer with over 44 years in exploration, leadership and adventure. For his lifetime contribution to mountaineering, he was awarded the Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award by the President of India in 2014. In 2005 he led the 1st IAF expedition to Mt. Everest by the North route and successfully achieved summit.
Anindya Mukherjee - celebrated Mountaineer and Alpinist and his adventures seek no bounds. While having raced in a contest of speed on Elbrus, he has chased a fictional character’s trail from Mombasa to the Mountains of the Moon in Uganda.
Alumni trek to Kedartal Lake (4750m)
In view of celebration of 175 years of IIT Roorkee, an Alumni trek to Kedartal was organized by HEC from 7- 21 May, 2022 which saw 25 participants in total, out of which 21 reached the summit.
The trek started on the early morning of 8 may from the Gangotri Dham. The first base camp was Bhoj Kharak on the night of 8 may, next day was the trek from Bhoj Kharak to Kedar Kharak & camping there. Kedartal lake was summitted on 10 may, which was situated at the feet of the legendary mountains like Mt. Thalaysagar, Bhrigupanth, Jogin peaks etc and return journey to the kedarkharak campsite was then started on that day itself. On next day i.e. 11 May, after descending to Gangotri dham via Bhoj Kharak campsite, the participants prayed at the temple and reached the institute on early morning of 12 may.
The trek was led by Deepak Yadav (Secretary HEC then), Ankit Dudi (Trek leader) and Hemant Adhikari (Trek leader).
Alumni Participants were Nitish Verma , Bhavya Maida, A.K. Srivastava (DY. Registerar DRMM IITR), Areen Srivastava , Durga Prasad Murmu, Hari Singh Nag, Ajay Kumar Agarwal , Mukul Agarwal , Veena Rani Meena, Saksham Sarwari, Siddhant Malhotra, Nikhil Nehra, Gaurav Kumar, Shreyas Singh, Kartikeya Ashok, Dinesh Jangir, Amandeep Singh, Nagendra Singh Rajput, Shrikant, Rajkumar Khichar, Subhash Bagaria and Jeetesh Yadav.
Friendship Peak Expedition (5289m)
As a part of the 175-year celebration of the institute and HEC’s 51st anniversary, a trek to Friendship Peak, located in the largest range of the Lesser Himalayas, the Pir Panjal, close to Manali, Himachal Pradesh was organized by the HEC. A team of 18 IIT Roorkee students, including two women, successfully completed the expedition during September 21-25, 2022.
The crew was led by Ankit Dudi and Omkar Tiwari, both undergraduate students at IIT Roorkee and expedition leaders at HEC who were accompanied by IIT Roorkee staff Varun Tyagi to the summit. Trek guides were Charlie, Ravi Thakur, Saurabh Negi and Kailash.
Four of the 18 participants reached the mountain's summit, namely, Ankit Dudi, Annika Johanne Dold, Puneeth Vishishth R and Varun Tyagi (Faculty). All 18 members reached 4800 metres.
Pin Parvati Pass Expedition (5320m)
During the week of September 21–27,2022, a group of 15 IIT Roorkee students attempted the Pin Parvati pass (5320 m) as a part of 175th year anniversary celebrations of IITR. With a height of 5320 meters, Pin Parvati Pass is a mountain in Himachal Pradesh, India giving views of glaciers close to the pass, thick woods next to Kheer Ganga, the pulley bridge at Tundabhuj, Mantalai marshes, and alpine meadows of Thach.
The trek was organised and carried out by the Himalayan Explorers' Club (HEC) of IIT Roorkee to mark the 51st anniversary of HEC and the 175th anniversary of the institute with trek leaders Amandeep, Dinesh Jangir, Gaurav Dhakad ,Adesh Dular (senior trek leader) and trek guides, Chandan Thakur and Pankaj.
Trek was not completed due to heavy snowfall at the Pass. All the participants returned in great health after treating their eyes to the magnificent views of Spiti valley and Parvati valley.
