Sangeeta Sindhi Bahl climbs Mount Everest at 53. Sangeeta Sindhi Bahl climbs Mount Everest at 53. Seven years after she began her quest to climb the highest mountain peaks in each of the seven continents, Gurgaon’s 53-year-old Sangeeta Sindhi Bahl, a former Miss India finalist in 1985, became the oldest Indian woman to scale world’s highest peak Mt Everest last week on May 19. Bahl, who originally hails from Jammu, bettered the record previously held by Prem Lata Aggarwal who had become the oldest Indian woman to scale Mt Everest at the age of 48 in 2011. Bahl had scaled Mt Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak in 2011 along with her husband Ankur Bahl and has now climbed six of the seven highest peaks of each continent. “Last year, when I made my first attempt to scale Mt Everest, we were evacuated after my health deteriorated. My husband Ankur Bahl, who had scaled Mt Everest on May 19, 2016, kept talking about achieving this feat and it was he, who motivated me to try again. Reaching the summit was a dream come true and it was like starting my childhood once again at this age. I have climbed five highest peaks of five continents but reaching the top of the world has a completely different feeling,” said Bahl while speaking with The Indian Express from the Mt Everest base camp. A Miss India finalist in 1985, Bahl, who is the founder of Impact Image Consultants in Gurgaon, worked in the aviation industry apart from designing uniform for some of the airlines in India and abroad. It was in 2011 that the professional thought about mountaineering and climbed Mt Kilimanjaro (5895 M) with her husband. Two years later, Bahl climbed Mt Elbrus (5642 M), Europe’s highest peak before becoming the third Indian woman climber to climb Mt Vinson (4897 M) in Antarctica in 2014. The same year, Bahl tried to scale Mt McKinley in North America before she suffered a knee injury. One year later, Bahl scaled Mt Aconcagua (6962 M), highest peak of South America. “Initially, when I applied for a mountaineering course at the Himalayan Institute of Mountaineering, Darjeeling, my application was rejected as I was above 40 years. My husband, who has scaled the seven highest summits of each continent, would help me train. Incidentally, I climbed Mt Everest on the same date as my husband did two years ago,” said Bahl. Seven years after she began her quest to climb the highest mountain peaks in each of the seven continents, Gurgaon’s 53-year-old Sangeeta Sindhi Bahl, a former Miss India finalist in 1985, became the oldest Indian woman to scale world’s highest peak Mt Everest last week on May 19. Bahl, who originally hails from Jammu, bettered the record previously held by Prem Lata Aggarwal who had become the oldest Indian woman to scale Mt Everest at the age of 48 in 2011. Bahl had scaled Mt Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak in 2011 along with her husband Ankur Bahl and has now climbed six of the seven highest peaks of each continent. For all the latest Chandigarh News, download Indian Express App

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