Thursday, December 2, 2010

Mount Everest with Basanta & Party

Many thanks to Mr Basanta Singha Roy for a CD containing vidiography of their climbing and concurring the Mount Everest in the last March/April this year. Basanta the ace mountaineer and an employee in Punjab National Bank and his mate Mr Debasis Chakraborty of Income Tax Department both  hail from the working class background dreamt to concur the highest pick of the world. In translating their dream into reality, they had to arrange Rs. 72 lakhs in Indian currency which was impossible for them unless aided by some agencies including CPIM led West Bengal State Government. Both the mountaineers have exhausted their last personal resources amounting to Rs.17 lakhs only as I heard from one of their close associates, Mr. Goutam Chakraborty, an employee of the chief minister's office in Kolkata. I've no word sufficient enough to praise the gentlemen for their courageous act of scaling the Everest. But I've the best regard for these two Bengali guys for their sacrifices and success. They both aged 50 + years have proved that age was no way barrier to make it possible. Anyone can do anything if he painstakingly and passionately desires. I'm not of that group of intoxicated those who often refer a millionaire Bengali cricketer for making the Bengali nation proud. The struggle and heroic achievements of Basanta & associates are hardly promoted by the media. The CD, a publication of Moutaineers' Association of Krishnanagar, Church Road, Krishnanagar, Nadia, West Bengal is available at www.mak.org.in . Any  person interested in extending assistance may kindly contact basanta_singha@rediffmail.com or through their mobile 09433465868 as published on the CD cover.