KATHMANDU: Nepal on Wednesday revoked the Everest summit certificates of two Indian climbers for faking their 2016 ascent, and banned them and their team leader from mountaineering in the country for six years, officials said.
Narender Singh Yadav and Seema Rani Goswami said they reached the top of the world’s highest mountain in the 2016 spring season, and Nepal’s tourism department certified their claim at the time.
But outrage erupted among Indian mountaineers after Yadav was listed for the prestigious Tenzing Norgay Adventure Award last year, triggering an investigation.
Tourism Ministry spokesman Tara Nath Adhikari told AFP their investigations and enquiries with other climbers revealed that the two “never reached the summit”.
“They couldn’t produce any evidence of their ascent to the peak… they even failed to submit reliable photos of them at the summit,” Adhikari said.
