‘Victory is always possible for the person who refuses to stop fighting, and there is only one way to succeed in anything, and that is to give everything to your goal. To do so, you need strong willpower. Otherwise, you’ll leave your goal midway.’ Ramlal Sharma, the youngest Mount Everest climber of Haryana, had strong belief and determination when he decided to summit Mount Everest.
He came from a below poverty line family, and his father worked as a vegetable seller. For him, luxurious life was nothing but a far-fetched dream. He didn’t even get a chance to relish necessities. Despite the financial challenges, he dared to dream big and even achieved it. Do you want to know how? Let us hear his story.
Youngest Mount Everest Climber of Haryana – My Story
I’m Ramlal Sharma. I was born and raised in Tohana, a small town in the Indian state of Haryana. I got inspired by some television shows in my childhood, and I dreamt of participating in adventurous sports like hiking and trekking. At such a young age, I aimed to do something different with my life.
My father worked as a vegetable vendor. He had to do a lot to raise his three children. When I discussed my dream with my family, they were taken aback because we had no financial support. Other than this, no one in my background ever thought of doing something as dangerous as mountain climbing.
My Guruji Sh. Vinay Verma stood by me, and he convinced everyone to let me pursue it. I didn’t have the funds to do the introductory course, so we did crowdfunding, and I enrolled in base camp. Everyone applauded the achievement when I returned to the town after completing it.
Then I was supposed to enroll in an advanced camp, but I didn’t have enough capital to continue. Again, people helped me out, and I joined the camp where I learned more about mountain climbing. It worked more like the last nail in the coffin. From here, I finally decided that ‘Yes, I want to summit Mount Everest.’
There is another incident that contributed to the determination. I had won a national medal in shooting and held a function to celebrate my victory. There were the other two players as well. I have no idea what went wrong, but they pulled my name out of the list and only honored those two players. People said, ‘Politics is behind this decision.’ Honestly, I felt humiliated, and I decided to take it as a challenge. So I vouched mentally, ‘That one day, I’ll do something so big that all of them will call me to honor my hard work and to celebrate my success.’ This pledge worked as fuel in the fire.
After clearing both base camps, I wanted to go to Nepal for further training, but they were charging 25 Lakh rupees. It was a whopping amount for a person like me. We barely had any money to fulfill our necessities so submitting 25 lakhs rupees for a training course was nearly impossible.
I told my Guru Sh. Vinay Verma suggested that I should give up, but I was in no mood to accept defeat. Again, I started collecting funds from people. Each day, I used to go door to door to assemble the money. Villagers mocked me, saying, ‘What will you do by climbing Mount Everest? You’ll die there. Stop thinking about it. A few others said, ‘If you don’t have money to achieve your goal, leave it. Why are you dragging us in it? Why should we help you?’ It was disheartening, but I didn’t care about it. I wanted to do it anyhow. I even considered Organisations and NGOs, but no effort was fruitful.
At one point, I raised my hands, and I decided to give up. Sir Kishan Prabhakar had donated one lakh rupees, so I went to return the amount. I said, ‘I don’t think I can ever collect this amount. Please take your money back.’ But rather than taking it back, he gave 9 lakh rupees. He said, ‘5 lakh rupees are from a businessman, and 4 lakh is from my side.’
From here, Collecting money to support the Ramlal Sharma campaign began. Crowdfunding, door-to-door collection, journalists, school and college students, everyone contributed to it. Surprisingly, I got the money and registered in the training academy.
Surviving in the base camp was equally challenging as they spoke in their local dialect and wouldn’t understand a word. Apart from it, I didn’t know English that much. So it was difficult to express my views and doubts over significant issues. I used to explain them in sign language.
Before going to Mount Everest, we were supposed to summit another Island. It was more like a semi-final round for all of us. I had to clear it if I wanted to go further. We started climbing at night, and the mountain was full of snow that was reaching my knees. It was indeed a new experience for me, a tough and challenging one.
Sun was about to rise when we reached the ice point. The climbing was so tricky, and I almost fell two-three times. It was a death zone which was the most challenging part of the journey. Here, you have to climb through the ladder. I puked out at that point, and blood came out of my mouth. I lost consciousness for a few moments, and I fell to the ground. Then I motivated myself to get back to continue because people were praying for my victory. I couldn’t have given up like this.
I started walking again and finally. I reached the peak. I began to cry like a child when I reached the final point of Island Peak. Everyone was surprised because I was left behind. They asked, ‘How did you do it? You were left behind.’ I said, ‘I did it because I wanted to do it.’
From here, strict training to climb Mount Everest began. We were trained hard to get accustomed to the environment. After the training period, we finally decided to start climbing.
In the initial part of the journey, we juggled through base camp 1, camp 2, camp 3. The journey was truly traumatic, tragic, but adventurous. Taking a single step felt like fighting for life.
Some of my group mates had lost their lives. There was a point where disappointment crawled in my heart. I thought I was going to die. From base camp 4, I called my Guruji Sh. Vinay Verma and I said, ‘My group mates have died, and there are chances that I may not return home. Maybe I’ll die too. Perhaps it’s my last call. You may not hear my voice again. Do convey my message to my parents. Tell them to stay happy and not to mourn my death.’ He was shocked, and he started crying on the phone.
He answered, ‘Ramlal, how can you say it? Everyone in the town is praying for your victory. They’re fasting for you. Don’t lose your heart. You’ll make it happen.’ He boosted my confidence. I reminded myself that I could not give up, so I moved forward and received my oxygen cylinder from camp three then I restarted the journey.
Continue reading part-2 of this story.
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