lieutenant-Colonel Ranveer Singh Jamwal, a tireless mountaineer from Badhori Village of Samba district in Jammu, is all set to accomplish his mission of scaling seven summits i.e. the highest mountains of each of the seven continents, in the coming months.
A veteran of more than 24 mountaineering expeditions across four continents, the Army officer, Jamwal, got commissioned into 11 Jats in 2002. He has already scaled five summits and has now set his eyes on Denali peak in Alaska Range of North America and Mount Vinson in Antarctica.
On Sunday as he arrived here after completing a hat-trick of climbing Mount Everest on May 19, 2016, he was accorded red carpet welcome by thousands of people from the Jammu airport road to his native village.
Along the way people showered petals and greeted him for achieving the rare feat of scaling highest peak of the world three times in a row.
lt-Col Jamwal scaled Mount Everest for the first time in May 2012 leading a 17-member team as deputy team leader.
In 2013, Jamwal once again led a team of 20 climbers and led from the front to guide the summit team.
In 2015, he was along with his team of climbers at the Everest Base Camp when Nepal was rocked by a devastating earthquake. He not only survived the avalanche while remaining at Khumbu Glacier helped in the evacuation of 22 bodies and 60 wounded mountaineers.
Since the mission 2015 was aborted midway lt Col Jamwal once again led the team of 14 mountaineers and climbed Mount Everest on May 19, 2016.
Speaking to the The Pioneer in an exclusive interview, lt Col Ranveer Singh Jamwal said, “I find myself very lucky that I was given an opportunity by the Indian Army on three occasions to lead the expeditions to Mount Everest and we successfully achieved our task of unfurling the Tricolor at the top”.
Recipient of Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award, lt Col Jamwal also received training in Swiss Mountain School and is a known rescue specialist of the Indian Army. He has done various successful rescue expeditions. In November 2008, when six Armymen and four civilians were trapped in Gurez sector, he was tasked to take out the bodies from the avalanche-hit site. In February 2016, when 10-member patrolling team of Indian soldiers was hit by a massive avalanche in Siachen, he guided rescue teams from New Delhi to carry out search operations to retrieve any survivors.
lt Col Jamwal had earlier climbed Mount Aconcagua (January 2013), Mount Killimanjaro (September 2010), Mount Elbrus (September 2014) and Cartsensz Pyramid (October 2015).
In his capacity as environmentalist, his team was instrumental in carrying out back-to-back cleaning campaigns in the Everest Region, clearing more than 4,000 kgs of garbage, in 2013, from higher camps of Everest also called as death zone because of very low oxygen.
This was widely appreciated by the environment agencies around the world. During the massive disaster of 25 April 2015 in which the whole Nepal was shaken, Indian Army stood firm at Everest Base Camp and helped the avalanche victims in terms of medical aid, shelter & food and after the evacuation, Indian Army team also cleared approximately 3,000 kg of garbage from Everest because of the massive avalanche thus getting accolades from Nepali & foreign climbers and environmental agencies around the world.
Commenting on the changes he is witnessing in the Mount Everest region and at base camps, lt Col Jamwal claimed Khumbu glacier is melting rapidly due to ill-effects of global warming. He said the environmentalists must take note of the alarming situation and create more awareness on the subject.
When asked whether he would be able to lead another expedition to Mount Everest next year, lt Col Jamwal said, if given an opportunity he would be the happiest person to accept the challenge. “I don’t want to quit, I want to complete all my missions in life as a true soldier,” he said.