Kanchha Sherpa, last surviving member of pioneering Mount Everest expedition, dies at 92
Kathmandu (AP): Kanchha Sherpa, the last surviving member of the mountaineering expedition team that first conquered Mount Everest, died early Thursday, according to the Nepal Mountaineering Association.
Kanchha died at age 92 at his home in Kapan in the Kathmandu district of Nepal, confirmed Phur Gelje Sherpa, the association president.
“He passed away peacefully at his residence,” Phur Gelje Sherpa told The Associated Press, adding that he had been unwell for some time. “A chapter of the mountaineering history has vanished with him.”
Last rites will be held Monday, he said.
Kanchha Sherpa was among the 35 members of the team that put New Zealander Edmund Hillary and his Sherpa guide Tenzing Norgay atop the 8,849-metre (29,032-foot) peak on May 29, 1953.
A mountain guide for most of his life, he was one of three Sherpas to reach the final camp before the summit with Hillary and Tenzing.
But he never climbed to the summit of Everest himself, as his wife considered it too risky, he said in a March 2024 interview. He forbade his children from becoming mountaineers.
Well-liked and widely respected in the climbing community, Kanchha “was full of energy, and even after retiring and in his old age, he was trekking to monasteries all over the Everest region for religious ceremonies,” said Ang Tshering Sherpa of the Nepal Mountaineering Association.
Kanchha was born in 1933 in the village of Namche in the Everest foothills, when most members of Nepal's Sherpa community earned their livings farming potatoes and herding yaks.
He spent his childhood and young adult years earning a meagre living through trading potatoes in neighbouring Tibet. When he and several friends later visited Darjeeling, India, he was persuaded to train for mountain climbing, and he began working with foreign trekkers.
He began mountaineering when he was 19 and remained active in the expedition sector until the age of 50.
In 1953, his father's friendship with Tenzing Norgay helped Kanchha secure a job as a high-altitude porter for Tenzing and New Zealander Edmund Hillary when they made the world's first summit of Everest.
He was one of three Sherpas who reached the last camp below the summit, above the 7,900-metre-high (26,000-foot-high) South Col.
They first heard of the successful ascent on the radio and were reunited with the summit duo back at Camp 2, at around 6,400 metres (21,000 feet).
“We all gathered at Camp 2 but there was no alcohol so we celebrated with tea and snacks,” he said. “We then collected whatever we could and carried it to base camp.”
Kanchha made other Everest climbs over the years, reaching various altitudes.
The route they opened from the base camp to the summit is still used by climbers. Only the section from the base camp to Camp 1 over the unstable Khumbu Icefall changes every year. But late in life, Kanchha had mixed feelings about the mountain's fate as an adventure tourism destination.
In an interview with The Associated Press in March 2024, he expressed concerns about overcrowding and filth at the world's highest peak. He urged people to respect the mountain, revered as the mother goddess Qomolangma among the Sherpas, Himalayan people renowned as mountaineering guides.
“It would be better for the mountain to reduce the number of climbers,” he said.
“Qomolangma is the biggest god for the Sherpas,” Kanchaa added. “But people smoke and eat meat and throw them on the mountain.”
Kanchha's father was also a mountaineer and joined an unsuccessful Everest expedition from the Tibetan side a few years before the 1953 conquest of the peak, according to Kanchha's son-in-law, Nawang Samden Sherpa.
In 2013, Kanchha was honoured by the Nepalese government during the 50th anniversary of the conquest of Mount Everest, joining relatives of Tenzing and Hillary in a chariot that was driven around the capital of Kathmandu.
In his retirement, Kanchha lived in Namche, where the family runs a small hotel catering to trekkers and climbers.
Kanchha Sherpa is survived by his wife, four sons, two daughters and grandchildren.
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Sensex, Nifty tumble as Budget proposes to raise Securities Transaction Tax to 0.05 pc on commodity
Mumbai (PTI): Stock market benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty tumbled on Sunday afternoon trade after the Budget proposed to raise Securities Transaction Tax to 0.05 per cent on commodity futures from 0.02 per cent.
The government will tax buyback proceeds for all types of shareholders as capital gains, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Sunday.
After fluctuating in early trade, the 30-share BSE Sensex later bounced back but pared all gains amid the Budget presentation.
It later plunged 2,370.36 points, or 2.88 per cent, to slip below the 80,000-mark to 79,899.42 during the afternoon trade. The 50-share NSE Nifty tanked 748.9 points, or 2.95 per cent, to 24,571.75.
From the 30 Sensex firms, Bharat Electronics tanked 6.50 per cent. State Bank of India, HCL Tech, Tata Steel, Asian Paints, and Eternal were also among the laggards.
Sun Pharma, Sun Pharma, Kotak Mahindra Bank, and Tata Consultancy Services were the gainers.
"The increase in Securities Transaction Tax (STT), especially in futures and options, is likely to act as a marginal negative for foreign portfolio investor (FPI) flows in the near term, particularly for high-frequency and derivative-focused global funds," Aakash Shah, Technical Research Analyst at Choice Equity Broking, said.
Foreign institutional investors bought equities worth Rs 2,251.37 crore on Friday, according to exchange data.
Asian markets are closed on Sunday due to holidays. US markets ended lower on Friday.
On Friday, the Sensex declined 296.59 points, or 0.36 per cent, to settle at 82,269.78. The Nifty dropped 98.25 points, or 0.39 per cent, to end at 25,320.65.
