Giripremi, a Pune-based mountaineering club, has planned an ambitious expedition to Mt. Meru, a 6,660-metre-tall mountain located in the Garhwal Himalayas. The climbing and support team left Pune on May 11 for the expedition. The team of 11, out of which six are from Pune, is being led by Umesh Zirpe, a veteran mountaineer and a Shri Shiv Chhatrapati awardee.
Zirpe told The Indian Express that experienced climbers will attempt the summit from the South-West ridge, a route that has never been attempted by an Indian team before. “The Giripremi team will become the first Indian team to climb Mt. Meru if they make it to the summit,” he said.
Till now, Giripremi climbers have reached the summit of eight of the top fourteen mountains in the world, including Mt. Everest, Mt. Kanchenjunga and Mt. Annapurna. Previously in 2021, the team of climbers from the club unfurled the Indian flag on Mt. Manda, a challenging mountain in the Indian Himalayas.
All these expeditions have been led by Zirpe and now, the Mt. Meru expedition will be attempted by a team consisting of experienced climbers like Ashish Mane, summiter of five eight-thousander (more than 8,000 metre) mountains, Dr. Sumeet Mandale, summiter of Mt. Cho Oyu, Mt. Kanchenjunga, Mt. Annapurna and Mt. Manda, Krishna Dhokale, summiter of Mt. Everest and Mt. Kanchenjunga, Vivek Shivade, summiter of Mt. Kanchenjunga, Mt. Ama Dablam and Mt. Manda, Pawan Hadole, summiter of Mt. Manda and Varun Bhagwat, an ace rock climber and mountaineer.
Wing Commander Devidutta Panda, the former vice principal of Himalayan Mountaineering institute (HMI), Darjeeling, and a Giripremi member, will also join the team. Vinod Gusain and Hawaldar Lale Poon, senior instructors at Nehru Institute of Mountaineering (NIM), Uttarkashi, will be the invitee climber-members for the expedition. Akhil Katkar, Abhay Khdedkar and Nikunj Shah will join the team as support members while P Cube has offered the title sponsorship for the expedition.
Mt. Meru is in Uttarakhand between Mt. Thalai Sagar and Mt. Shivling. Meru is known for the most challenging climbing routes. The success rate of the climbing expeditions is significantly low at Mt. Meru. There are three peaks of Mt. Meru and the South peak is the tallest of all (6,660 metre). The Central peak (6,310 metre) is the toughest of the three while the North peak stands at 6,450 metre. The word Meru is derived from Sanskrit which means the peak or the pinnacle.
