At 29,029 feet, Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain on earth (CC/ wikimedia.org/ Rdevany)
NEW DELHI, April 1 (UPI) -- A team of Indian specialists is ready to ascend Mt. Everest to rid it of 8,800 pounds of debris left by generations of climbers.
As part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "Swachh Bharat" or "Clean India Mission," a campaign to improve India's hygiene, sanitary and infrastructure practices, a 34-person team will ascend Mt. Everest, the highest summit in the world at 29,029 feet in the Himalaya Mountains, to collect the garbage and other detritus left by previous climbing expeditions.
The climb is also in recognition of the 50th anniversary of the first Indian ascent of the mountain, by Capt. M.S. Kohli of the Indian Navy and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, in 1965.
The team will leave for Kathmandu, Nepal, Saturday and in mid-May will begin scaling Mt. Everest and nearby Mt. Lhoste, the world's fourth-highest mountain. The plan, in the name of cleanliness, is to return with an assortment of tents, sleeping bags, oxygen cylinders and perhaps corpses, left by prior expeditions.
"Sadly, Mount Everest is now also called the world's highest junkyard. Our aim is to carry forward our prime minister's dream of cleanliness everywhere, including at the top of the world. We will target the mountaineering waste from Camp 1 (at 19,695 feet elevation) to the summit (at 29,028 feet). There are old cylinders, tents, tins, packets, equipment and other mountaineering waste," Maj. Ranveer Singh Jamval, the team leader, told the newspaper India Today.
Previous clean-up efforts of Mt. Everest since 2008 have recovered over 3,300 pounds of trash.
